The Garden of Pleasure Last
by Y St. Ace
Summary: Re-telling of the Jade Empire story. Wu/Sagacious Zu. *STORY COMPLETE* I hoped you enjoyed it!
1. Chapter 1

_"Be the first to take the world's trouble to heart, be the last to enjoy the world's pleasure."_

_Fan Zhongyan_

Dawn Star carefully placed the dirt around the young plant, a bamboo shoot. It stood at the end of her garden, apart and away from the flowers, in the least sunny spot. That shoot would live, despite the shadows it lived in.

Perhaps it would be many years before other settlers came here and found the ruins of the old buildings, but in time, this garden would grow and it would be here to greet them.

Wu watched from the bridge, not wanting to disturb her friend. This garden was how Dawn Star was making her peace. They had come here, to the ruins of their home, to make a living memorial to the friends they had lost during the Two River attack. That shoot had been at Wu's special request.

When her friend wiped her hands and stood up, she said, "It looks beautiful, Dawn Star."

Her friend was surprised. "You're back already."

"I've prepared the campsite." An outlying hut was still intact and would put a roof over their heads. This close to the school, old wounds were opened; it was too much for either of them to bed down in the ruins of their home.

They fished by the waters and took their freshly caught dinner back to their makeshift home. They did not speak much. Words were harder here and seemed out of place, so they were used sparingly.

As they bedded down in their camprolls, Dawn Star asked, "Will you be going tomorrow?"

"I do not know." Wu stopped. She didn't know what else to say.

She stared at the stars that pierced the thatch of the hut and listened. The crickets and frogs were the most vocal inhabitants of Two Rivers, but once she heard the yip of a fox and the harsh cry of the night thrush.

Wu could not sleep so she got up to join them. The dark was a comfortable friend now; it was something else she carried with her from the Necropolis.

She was drawn to the water lapping at the shore. The old path was overgrown with grass, and plants were attacking the cracked statute of Sun Hai.

Her fingers curled, her foot snapped out and it was dust. She immediately regretted her anger, only because it had led to a futile gesture. Stone could not hurt her now. The Emperor was dead. Long live the Empress.

She stared at the light on the water. Long ago, there had a been a ship there and she had seen her first Lotus Assassin. He led bloodthirsty brigands, wielded raw magical power without a thought, and controlled the dead like a god. He had been decisive, cold, commanding, and utterly terrifying. That had been the first Lotus Assassin she had seen.

It was the second that had brought her home.

* * *

Sky was entertaining Dawn Star with a story while Kang tinkered with another invention; one that he had promised had no explosive properties. Zu was gone. Zu was often gone.

Dawn Star's laughter, Sky's exaggerations, the clink of metal on metal; all of it irritated her.

Wu stood up quickly and strode out of the campsite. Dawn Star called after her, but she smiled, showed that she had her sword with her, and kept going. She didn't want questions or concern. She wanted to be alone. The pirates' lair had left her feeling drained far beyond a physical tiredness. She needed to find a place to clear her head and to rediscover her place in the world.

Tien's Landing was silent and the only light came from the lanterns outside the teahouse. She let her feet take her where they willed. They led her through the dark, behind the stilt dwellings. She stepped over a shallow creek and went over a fence. Then she found herself in a fallow field, now conquered by flowers and weeds, and lit by the stars.

There was a shadow, out of place. Her arms flowed to her side and all that was cold and sharp inside her went to her hands.

"What do you want?" Zu asked.

She relaxed and the ice evaporated into the air, a cold cloud in the summer air. "I didn't know anyone else was here. I'll leave you alone then."

"If you came here to interrogate me, that's a good idea." He turned away to stare at the flat muddy plain that stretched in front of them. "But if you're here to get away from Sky's inane babbling, feel free to stay."

Wu killed the smile that crept up her lips and sat on the ground, feeling the warm air and smelling the crushed flowers at her feet. The view - well, the view would be better when she closed the dam.

_If_ she closed the dam. She hadn't decided yet.

After a few minutes, she realized that she had to think about Zu to remember that he was there. It should not have surprised her. He had admitted to being a Lotus Assassin; no doubt, shadows were his second home. Yet she was not as skilled as believed - or she had come to trust Zu too much - if she could not keep him in her awareness.

But she was not here to think about her companions. She closed her eyes and let herself drift on the air that moved around her.

Wu did not know how long she sat there, but she was no closer to finding heart's ease or peace of mind in the field and trees than she had when she had been surrounded by people. She stood up to leave.

Zu spoke out of the darkness. "You're restless."

"It's that obvious?" She ran her hand along the tops of the weeds. "At my school, Master Li would have us spar when we couldn't sleep. He said tired bodies would silence active minds."

"Your Master Li was not different in that respect from any master," Zu said, moving away from the tree. "I could do with a stretch. Let's spar."

She was surprised, but not displeased. Here was someone who had not only training but life experience. This would be much better than any sparring session at Two Rivers and less dangerous than the fighting she had been doing. "I would be honored."

Night blooming flowers, starlight, and the dead were their only witnesses. They bowed and then began.

Her hands snaked out, but he had her wrists. She tried to put her foot behind his knee, but his footwork was too quick. She broke free and took a step back.

Here was something she hadn't had in awhile - a challenge.

She didn't have much time to be thankful. Where had he kept his staff? - yet there it was in his hands and she had to leap and roll to scoop up Fortune's Favorite. She brought it up just as Zu brought his staff down upon her head.

His momentum brought the edge of her sword within an inch of her scalp. Hairs shorn off by her own sword drifted down in front of her eyes as he pressed the edge closer.

Her arm trembled. Zu was not fighting like the students at her school whose sole wish was to learn. He was not even fighting like a mercenary, spurred on by money and fear. Zu's style was backed by something much darker and much more powerful. A misstep with him would earn her more than a bruise.

She focused and pushed away with everything in her. Zu stumbled back. He recovered and swung the staff in circles, forcing her backwards. He had the advantage in reach and strength. She would have to disarm him immediately with her sword or beat him with skill.

In a real fight, indecision would kill her. She dropped her sword and found the cold place, the place that had always been inside her. The ice came easily to her hands.

She threw the shards at his face. He blocked the first volley, but missed the ones that she aimed at his shoulders and stomach. She hit him in the wrist and he dropped his staff.

Wu pulled hard at the world. There was so much cold hidden in the muddy ground that had been buried under a lake and river only a few weeks ago and she brought it to the surface, around Zu. He was done.

Wu walked around the pillar of ice, a perfect sculpture of a Lotus Assassin. She struck it with her fist. The ice exploded and Zu stood there, gasping; his breath a cloud in the summer air. When he was composed, she bowed. "Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to spar with you."

She felt the air part in front of her and she caught him by the wrist. She pulled him forward, turned, and held her hand a finger's width away from the pressure point on the side of his throat, then let him go.

"You were expecting that," he said. She may have even heard respect somewhere in his voice.

"Someone tried it before," she explained. "I won't fall for it twice."

He moved so fast that he had her back up against a tree. As his forearm crushed against her throat, she could feel his breath on her ear. "How about a third time?"

Before she could fight back, he let go and stepped back. Her hand went to her throat and she did not bow. Her voice rasped with pain and censure when she spoke. "And what did that teach me? Trust no one?"

"Trust whomever you like," Zu said. "That was a lesson about your enemy. Assassins, once given an order, won't stop to fulfill it. They will keep coming at you while they have breath in their bodies. Do not drop your guard. Do not show them mercy."

She did not like being lectured. Only Master Li had that privilege. "I know this."

"Do you? Where one falls, another takes his brother's place. Are you prepared for that? Once you've declared Death's Hand as your enemy, you are at war with every Assassin in the Empire."

If she believed that, then there was no hope and Master Li was as good as dead. "There are always exceptions," she protested.

"You have the exception," he said sharply. "There won't be another."

He left her there in the field with her sword at her feet. She did not follow him.

As she remembered the feeling of being trapped between the tree and the man, her face grew flush. She told herself it was because she had been taken off-guard.

Master Li would have been disappointed in her.


	2. Chapter 2

When Wu returned, Dawn Star was making a very simple breakfast.

"I'm sorry for being so late." She was. Dawn Star did not need any more worries.

"That's okay." Dawn Star did not look at her when she asked, "Did you - did you sense anyone?"

"No." Running into misty and mad reminders of the past had been their greatest concern, but Wu felt nothing. The only phantoms here were the ones born of expectant memory.

"You should sleep after breakfast," Dawn Star advised. She stirred the pot and began to hum a tune that had been popular in the capital.

This was the first time she'd heard Dawn Star sing in a very long time. To know her friend's heart was light enough to enjoy music, even in the skeleton of their home, boded well. A part of Dawn Star was moving on.

* * *

Cauldrons in hand, Wu and Dawn Star plodded along the uneven and broken flagstone path that led to the well. The villagers of Tien's Landing had warned them that the slow-running river water was not safe to drink now, but Hou had to have clean dishes to use for dinner.

"Tell me. What do you think about what's going on?" Wu asked her friend.

"I think that the quality of the food has gone up, thanks to Hou," Dawn Star said.

"While the quality of air has lessened, thanks to the Black Whirlwind," Wu quipped back.

Dawn Star laughed and it did Wu good to hear it. Pilgrim's Rest Inn had been far from restful for them. The mad spirits and the corruption in the forest had affected Dawn Star, and Wu had only been given more questions from the Water Dragon.

Wu wondered if she was losing her harmony and, if at the end of her time in Tien's Landing, she would have to seek Jian's training and not Mistress Vo's guidance.

They were lucky; there was no line at the well. They had performed this chore many times in Two Rivers and they fell into their old rhythm quickly.

"You seem troubled," Dawn Star observed, as she helped pull the bucket the last few inches over the lip of the well.

"Don't worry."

"I do worry. I think that you carry too much on your own shoulders." Dawn Star poured the water into the cauldron and returned the bucket to Wu. "You are always speaking with the others, getting their advice, asking their opinion - but in the end, we make you make the choices. It seems unfair."

Wu began lowering the bucket back into the well. "This is our trouble, not theirs. I will take advantage of our friends' experiences, but I will not force them to make decisions on our behalf."

The first cauldron was full. Dawn Star picked it up and said she would return shortly.

As soon as her friend's back was turned, Wu felt her serene mask crack. Guilt was a heavy weight to carry and, unlike Hou's pots and pans, she would not share her burden with others - not even Dawn Star.

Even now, she was drawn back into the what-ifs and might-have-beens. Perhaps if she had been there when the Lotus Assasins has appeared, Master Li would have fought, knowing he had someone to rely on. Perhaps if she had fought, he could have escaped. Perhaps -

She broke out of her contemplations when she saw Zu coming in her friend's place. "Where's Dawn Star?"

"She's at the camp. I told her I would take over her chores. I needed a break." Zu said as he approached. "You're picking up followers like a dog picks up fleas - and they are just as annoying."

"I see." She looked at him carefully. "And Dawn Star is alright?"

He seemed amused at her questioning. "If she weren't, what would I gain from not telling you?"

"Nothing. But she has a way of telling people she is perfectly fine, when it is clear she is troubled."

"I noticed."

Zu noticed a lot about Dawn Star. Sometimes it bothered her, the way she saw Zu watching her friend. It was not entirely her fault; Two Rivers was isolated and strangers were always suspect. A person who chose to live alone in a marsh full of brigands instead of a pleasant, peaceful hamlet struck an odd chord with her upbringing.

It did not help that his arms were dyed crimson to the elbow; a constant reminder of the men and women who had taken that home away from her.

They worked in silence. Hou needed a lot of clean water; he had taken many kitchenwares from Pilgrim Rest and even though he insisted they had never been used for the cannibals, she and Dawn Star had insisted on boiling the water and cleaning the pots again - just in case.

"Have you decided what you will do at the dam?" Zu asked.

It was her last task in Tien's Landing. She only needed the amulet piece before she could continue on to the Imperial Capital. "I will know what to do when I'm there, standing before the controls."

"Silver is more substantial than feelings," Zu said, as he passed her the bucket to pour, while he put another one on the rope.

When Dawn Star had told the others about what had happened at Pilgrim's Rest, Zu had not said anything, but she could feel his disapproval that they had not taken the offer from the innkeeper. "For a hermit, you are quite concerned with our earnings."

"I've become accustomed to this decadent luxury we're living in," he said with dry humour . "I would hate to see it disappear for lack of coins."

She smiled. It had taken her some time to understand his sarcasm, but now she welcomed it. Only now she had a serious question to ask and this seemed like the only time to ask it.

"Zu, you are skilled at seeing a personal advantage in a situation, but I don't see what you gain by being involved with Dawn Star and I. Even with our decadent luxury."

He took the rope from her hands. "What are you saying?"

"You didn't know Master Li. It wasn't your home that was destroyed."

"No, it was not." His black eyes were inscrutable. She waited for more, but he lowered the bucket into the well, stained red hands sliding over the rope with smooth even motions. She watched the muscles move in his shoulders and under his skin, as he brought it back up.

Wu was sure he would never elaborate and so she stepped forward with the last cauldron, the smallest one.

She stood next to him and when Zu spoke, his voice was low, a murmur over the sloshing water. "I stay because you have shown me a path I previously thought closed."

Wu didn't know what to say to that, so she took the cauldron from him and they walked back to their campsite in silence.

Later that evening, while they praised Hou's cooking, Wu found that she could not forget those words. Her gaze flicked over to the ex-assassin in the corner. He'd separated himself from the others, but that was no surprise there. Shadows were his home.

She looked too long, and she saw his muscles tense and then relax when he looked up and saw it was her who was scrutinizing him.

She looked away. It was rude to stare and she knew better; her chagrin was evident from the way her cheeks burned.


	3. Chapter 3

Dawn Star stood in the middle of the training ring and looked around, shading her face with her hand. "I wonder what Black Whirlwind is doing now."

Wu played the game and ignored their surroundings. "Drinking. Fighting. Whoring. At least two of those at once."

This was not their home. Their home had had beautiful trees, not burnt twigs that stood like chicken bones stuck in the ground. Their buildings had been humble and well-maintained, not wreckage in weeds.

Wu looked over at the main building, where Master Li had lived. The screens had been broken, giving the once imposing building a snaggle-toothed appearance. From what she could see inside, there was only darkness and shadows.

The cave was there. She wondered -

"I hope Sky is well." Dawn Star begin walking towards the area where the students quarters had been.

"Me too." Wu followed.

* * *

Wu stared at the Jade Heart. It pulsed steadily, releasing a soft blue glow with each beat. Such a small thing to control a raging river, such a small thing to contain such power.

She tore it from its restraints and the flash of light blinded her. The glow dripped through her fingers, and faded, as did the faint warmth the stone held.

"No words?" she asked her companion.

"I wasn't expecting you to do that," Zu said. He smiled, quick and not a little cruel, and she felt the heart in her hand pulse one last desperate time.

"I took your advice to heart. As it were." She pushed the stone into her pocket. "We have nothing left to do in Tien's Landing. It is time to go."

"I think that there's something else," he said quietly and looked up at the ridge. She saw shadows and movement where there should be none. She took the steps two at a time, so they would not be trapped on the stairs and out in the open.

The Lotus Assassins arrived just as she cleared the top. Wu recognized their leader, Inquisitor Lim, as he slithered his way to the front of the group. She only barely heard his taunts. Her blood was crackling in her veins and she felt the cold from the shadows, the valley, and the dead come to her fingertips.

"I don't know your face or if it might be worth anything to my Masters." Lim's good eye flicked away from her. "But you travel with the accursed Zu and his death may at least settle some old scores."

"What do you know of Sagacious Zu?" she blurted out.

Lim did not deign to answer her question. "Sagacious? Is that what you call yourself now? Hardly a worthy representation of the blood you spilled."

Zu's response was as cold as her hands. "You do not know me, assassin."

"Perhaps. But I know what you were. Not that it matters any more." The assassin gestured to those around him. "Enough talk. I will delay your death no longer! May your fall sate the anger of Death's Hand, will of the Emperor!"

The Inspector leapt at Zu.

Wu went for his entourage. She hadn't had many opportunities to use Storm Dragon and she relished the thought of making these clumsy soldiers, with their poor equipment and even poorer armor, dance for her. Fighting beside the assassins, they were children playing at 'Imperial Arena.' They died like men, though, with curses frozen in their mouth and her face burned in their open eyes.

The Assassins deserved to bleed and she unsheathed Fortune's Favorite. The first Assassin's fighting style reminded her of something - of someone - and she remembered Wen. "Black Leopard School?" she taunted. "I've seen it done better." The man's eyes widened and it was the opening she needed to drive her sword into his stomach. She stepped back and brought it overhead, decapitating the second Assassin who was trying to sneak up behind her.

Only Lim was left now. She stepped forward, but Zu saw her. "No!" he cried and the fury in his voice could be heard over the crack of his staff against Lim's armor. Her muscles surged with electricity, urging her to join the fight, but out of respect, she waited.

Her student-fighter eyes watched for false moves, for feint and subterfuge and for that moment when she knew who would win the fight and who would die. The staff gave Zu the advantage in reach but Lim was quick and knew how to move inside the strike range of the weapon. She watched Lim's poisoned hands, which shone with green phosphorescence in the gray light here in the shadow of the mountain.

If Lim gained the upperhand for a moment, she would join them. She'd rather weather Zu's wrath than his injury.

Then she felt it, she saw it, and she tasted it in her mouth. Lim was still fighting, but she knew he would die. The staff came around. She heard the bones crack and Lim misstepped. A rib had punctured his lungs, but he did not get a chance to draw a ragged, painful breath. The second crack was Lim's skull; Zu had stoved it in.

Congratulations died on her lips when she saw his ashen skin. "Zu, the poison - "

"I am familiar with the Viper style. Give me a moment and I will be fine." He found a seat on a broken stone and closed his eyes to meditate.

Wu then went to Lim's body. The rictus of his face gave him a particularly mad look. The shard of the amulet hung from his neck in a leather thong. His skin hadn't warmed it and she claimed it as her own. "I hope your spirit becomes quite insane," she told the dead man, as a final benediction.

Zu stood up when she approached.

"Rest. You aren't well," she urged.

He ignored her and leaned on his staff for support. "We should not linger here. If there are any assassins left in this area, they will come looking for their Master."

She looked at the path ahead, hating to prod, but wanting to know - needing to know every secret. She did not look at him when she asked, "Zu, I would like to talk about what Lim said."

"That is ... an old wound."

She waited. He would either continue or not. They walked in silence and then he said, "My departure from the Lotus Assassins was not gentle for either side. My immediate companions, those who were my brothers, fell by my hand."

She glanced at him and she saw the sadness there, but then it fell away. "Lim was not among them. He would have died if he was. I was labeled as the one who deserted, and I am occasionally recognized. The result is always the same. Another death. More blood spilled."

The next words were not for her. "Such a waste for a hatred they cannot even understand."

She did not understand either. She tried to, though. "It must be difficult to regret the deaths of so many."

"Regret?" He was scornful of her compassion. "I have no regret for killing anyone who challenged me of their own will. Death is a measurable cost of your actions. Some earn it sooner than others."

That was something she could understand.

"Strength is the way of things and death is the end or should be. Some do not respect either. They have enough of one to defy the other."

He was speaking in riddles and she could not blame it on the poison. "Enough of which? Strength or death?"

"Does it matter? Denying someone's strength is to place yourself above that person without merit. Denying death is to step outside the natural order. Both are harmful."

"Why did you leave the Assassins?" she asked. "Why do you hate them so much?"

"There is a place for the enforcer, the man or woman who brings death to those who have earned or otherwise deserve it. I consider that an honest calling."

She nodded. Some things, no matter how repulsive, had to be done for the sake of the Empire and for the sake of order.

He continued. "I did some harsh things while with the Lotus Assassins, but they no longer follow a path I recognize. They are a mirror of Death's Hand and he embodies corruption."

He had spoken to the air before, but now he looked her in the face. Anger and concern flickered in his eyes. "You will see as you get close to him. He draws out the worst in everyone and displays it for all to see."

His words were so certain, but she could not believe him now. She would have Master Li returned to her - or she would have revenge. "Death's Hand will fall like any other. You will see."

"You have no concept of the devotion of his followers," he scoffed.

She realized that he was right.

Wu could see that Hui the Brave was lost in thought. There were lines of weariness around the corners of her mouth that gave her face a pinched, tired look.

She looked up as Wu approached. "Did you get the piece of the amulet?"

Wu shook her head. "I have questions."

Hui's shoulders drooped for a moment. "More questions? I really don't know what else I can tell you."

Wu caught the sleeve of the waitress as she went by. "Tea for the two of us."

The waitress looked like she was going to argue, but she had a chance to take in Hui's armor and Wu's unconventional clothing. The woman wisely went back to the kitchen.

"I have questions about Zu," Wu said quietly.

The lines at Hui's lips drew tight and disappeared. "Everyone must have their private side."

Hui had said the same thing before when Wu had questioned her about Master Li. The woman certainly knew how to keep her counsel, but Wu was sick to death of secrets.

"My master trusted you and for that reason, I trust you," Wu began. She phrased her doubt carefully. "I don't know if traveling with Zu is what my master would want, not if he once was one of those who destroyed my home."

The waitress came with their tea. They sat in silence while the woman poured the tea for each of them. Hui reached for her stone mug first and regarded Wu over the edge of it. "Zu is an honorable man. Not a good man, perhaps, but an honorable one."

Wu took her mug and sipped the hot tea carefully. Hui's words were not what she wanted to hear, but were better than what she had expected.

Ever since she had stumbled across the man in the marsh, she had been torn between suspicion and respect. She would never have conjured Sagacious Zu's image had someone said 'hermit in a swamp.' But that is what she was given.

She had been ready to cut him down without a thought when she encountered him in the marsh; nothing would get in the way of her rescuing Dawn Star and punishing Gao. She had sworn at Zu for being a coward, then mistrusted him when his adamance had melted at the mention of Dawn Star. But he helped her find her friend and kill Gao; that was in his favor.

Things happened much too quickly after that. The flyers filled the skies like locusts and laid waste to their home. Master Li was missing. Her fellow students were dead or fled. Dawn Star was in tears. And the man she did not trust admitted that he had once been one of those people that had just destroyed her entire world.

"Do you trust him, Hui?" she asked.

"I trusted him enough - twenty years ago," the woman said.

"That was some time ago. And things change," Wu added quietly.

"They do." Hui picked up the teapot and moved it towards Wu's mug.

Wu covered the top with her hand. She stood up. "I found the amulet an hour ago, Hui. Thank you for your help. When I see Master Li again - "

"Say nothing." Hui stood up and bowed. "The amulet piece will tell him all he needs to know."

Wu watched Hui leave. The woman had refused her invitation to join them. She wondered where she would go and what kind of home she could find.

She paid for the drinks and then walked to the bottom of the hill in front of the teahouse, reflecting on her time in Tien's Landing. Mistress Vo and Jian the Iron Fist were waiting for her and they both told her that she must leave empty-handed. She was too chaotic for Vo and too harmonious for Jian.

"Another person who doesn't know their own mind," the old man sniffed.

"Don't listen to the old goat." The woman smiled. "There is a talent in being able to walk both paths, though I think you lean towards one rather than the other..."

Jian glanced at Wu. "And I would ask you, Vo, why you believe that when the dam is still _very_ open."

Wu thanked them both and wished them luck in their game before leaving.

The others were waiting for her aboard the Marvelous Dragonfly. Dawn Star pulled her in as Kang began pulling levers and pushing buttons. The Dragonfly lifted into the air and from this angle in the air, the mud flats spread out in front of Tien's Landing - the river a flat ribbon of blue in the middle of the brown.

Perhaps it was the wrong thing to do, keeping the dam open, she thought, and it wouldn't be pleasant initially, but in the end, the people of Tien's Landing would be stronger for it.

Just like she and Dawn Star were becoming stronger.


	4. Chapter 4

Dawn Star pushed the rubble around with the toe of her boot. They searched their own cabins to see if there was anything left of their possessions. There wasn't much of anything.

"They must have come back to search for supplies."

Dawn Star still believed Kia Min and others escaped. After everything, it was hard for Wu to be that hopeful. "Maybe."

"It's what we would have done."

"Yes, that's true."

Wu knelt down where her bed had used to be and pulled a piece of rotten wood aside. Bugs scattered off the top of her slightly charred memento box. She pulled it out of the ground and brushed off the ash and char.

It wasn't much; just a carved wooden box she had traded a necklace for with one of the children in Two Rivers. She used it to keep special things in it; special being relative to a poor ten year old. Master Li had not believed in frivolous things, but she had.

She opened the box and found her favorite green stone from the river bank, a trampled ribbon she'd found on the ground that she'd spent her spare time washing until it became clean again, and a bit of metal she'd found in a cave that she called 'ghost gold,' though it was not gold at all. Treasures to her, but no one else.

It was strange, how her heart moved to see it all again, when it was a shrine to a time and feelings that were false.

"I remember that stone," Dawn Star said. She picked it out of the box and held it up, so that the light caught the green. It was no piece of jade, but it was beautiful in its own way, a way that was separate from any memory.

She would keep it. It reminded her of another stone.

* * *

"The Imperial City," Dawn Star breathed. "It's beautiful."

"Look!" Wild Flower pointed towards the nose of the Marvelous Dragonfly, at what looked like a glittering jewel in the sky. It was the Imperial Palace. From here Wu could see the water falling to the Empire below. All of it was -

"Amazing, right?" Sky leaned over her shoulder. "I remember the first time I saw it. Not from up here, though. This view is a little more impressive."

Kang turned around. "Do we have our silver?" he asked.

"Silver? For what?" Wu wracked her brain for anything Kang had said about silver.

"Eyes forward, Kang! Eyes forward!" Hou cried.

"There are landing fees. Oh yes. No free air in the Empire." Kang guided the Dragonfly around the tangle of airships that were floating above the docks. "I hope we have money for that!"

"I hope we have money for wine," Black Whirlwind added.

"Pay attention!" Hou screeched, as the Marvelous Dragonfly's wing missed another airship's anchoring ropes.

Wu's stomach dropped as the Dragonfly dipped below the walls of a docking area, cutting off her view of the capital. A man in opulent robes, flanked by two servants, was waving at them from the flagstones below.

"Here come the money collectors!" Kang said as he powered down the ship for a landing. Wu jumped out of the ship as it touched down to approach this man who seemed to be waiting for them.

"We've been waiting for you," said the yard manager cried. He bowed so low that his topknot brushed the stones at his feet. His servants helped Dawn Star and her from the airship. "Everything has been prepared for your arrival. We have rooms in the dock hotel for you - as many as you need. Since the Emperor began restricting flyer travel, we haven't had many visitors as it is, but - ahem! Not that I have anything to say against the Emperor; may his vision never be clouded."

Wu kept her face neutral. "And the arrangements were made by our friend..."

The loquacious manager continued. "The woman in black, yes. Very mysterious, very 'mind your own business.' But she pays in silver, she pays on time, and she pays well! Very well indeed! Would you like to see your rooms now?"

"When we come back," Wu said as the others exited the Dragonfly. She wanted to get out into the city as soon as possible. Based on what she had seen in the sky, their search for Master Li could take weeks.

The manager bowed and backed away. As soon as they walked into the loading and unloading area, they were stopped by Imperial soldiers who questioned their presence in the city. Only the appearance of the Princess Sun Lian stopped them.

The meeting with the princess did not go well.

"Are ladies supposed to do that?" Wildflower whispered, as the noblewomen, now disheveled and dirty from their fainting spells, followed the exasperated princess out of the landing area.

"I don't know. I've never met a lady before." Wu held the gift from Lian in her hands. It was small and not too light. In the layers of wrapping, it could be anything. "So. The meeting with Silk Fox?"

"Trap," Zu said immediately.

"I have to agree," Sky said.

"She did give me a present." Wu unwrapped it carefully, removed the gem wrapped in silk, and smiled at the note inside. She had never felt herself to be a naturally charming person. The gift could be quite useful in certain situations. That was for another time though. "But we can't rely on her. Sky, can you speak to some of your old friends about getting into the Imperial Palace? Kang, could I trouble you with some inventions that perhaps could get us there? And, I'm sorry, Wildflower, but could Chai Ka speak with the Heavenly Powers to see what they might do?"

They nodded, submitting to her orders without question.

"I can go see how the city's wine supplies are," the Black Whirlwind volunteered.

"And I guess I should see how my wonderful wife fared without me." Hou sighed. "It would be a pity if she had died from a broken heart while I was gone. Unlikely, but a pity."

Wu took Dawn Star by the arm. "And why don't you explore?"

Her friend shook her head emphatically. "While you hunt for Master Li alone? I couldn't face him knowing you did everything while I went sight-seeing."

"I was hoping that you'd see what the mood of the city is."

Dawn Star looked away. "I don't really want to look for ghosts - "

"No, no! I meant the mood of the people who live here. Rumors about the city, the Lotus Assassins, whatever you can find. No one will suspect you're anything other than - "

"A country peasant?" her friend suggested with a smile.

"A visitor to the capital." She pressed some coins into Dawn Star's hand. "People tend to loosen their mouths when you spend a little silver. Make it look good."

"What are you going to do?"

"Meet Silk Fox in the Scholar's Garden."

"And you know where the Scholar's Garden is?" Zu asked.

He had been so quiet there, that she hadn't thought about him. Nor had she thought about how she was going to get to the Garden. The sight of the people seething just beyond the stone arch was making her dizzy.

"Sagacious Zu, will it be safe for you to be out there" - Dawn Star waved at the crowds - "without some kind of disguise?"

"Those who would know me are either dead or will not be walking these streets. If they are out there, I will be gone before they know I'm here."

Wu did not like the idea of drawing attention to herself by asking for directions. This was a better alternative. "Then let's go. I'd like to hear Silk Fox's proposal today so we can make a decision tonight."

"Stay close," he warned and then stepped into the human river. She plunged in after him.

She kept Zu's back in front of her and tried to focus on only him, wishing they could move faster through this crowd, wishing that she could get air to breathe. The different odors were like a tangle of overgrowth that she had to work through; she smelt sweat and day old food and dirt and the undeniable stench of tanneries. The heat from the sun and the air's humidity only intensified the smells.

Zu glanced over his shoulder at her and then suddenly pulled her into a a small alley. The stone scraped her shoulders; alley was a generous word for this space between buildings.

"Trouble?" she asked.

"No." He peered around the corner. "It's been awhile since I was in the city."

Zu was a master of understatement. She wondered if this would be another flying swimming ox problem. "Are we lost?"

"No," he snapped. "But the city has changed since I was last here. I need a moment."

She waited in lee of the narrow alley while Zu got his bearings. The noise washed up in between the walls and she heard town criers relaying the most recent edicts, men and women haggling with sellers whose wares spilled into the already crowded streets. Oxen lowed and wooden wheels rumbled over the paving stones..

This place where they stopped; it was too narrow. She did not mind being with Zu when they were with the group, but when she was this close, it was impossible to ignore how dangerous he felt.

"You are staring," he said.

This was not the first time she'd been caught staring at her companions. But maybe it was because she'd seen the same faces for twenty years in Two Rivers. There was no room for a half-bow to apologize so she begged his pardon.

"Sky also stares," he added.

"At you?" The two men had never been fast friends, but their animosity was getting ridiculous. "I will speak to him - "

"Not at me. At you. His eyes are always on you; too much, I think." Zu's gaze didn't waver from the street and the people on it, but he still said, "You are blushing."

She knew she was and she knew why. Two Rivers had not been so complicated. In Two Rivers, there were men who were her master, men old enough to be her grandfather, men who were husbands to women in the village, and men who were students who could not match her in anything.

But Two Rivers was gone and things were not simple anymore.

She touched the amulet, as she often did when she was unsettled. She'd left in stones of blue, they pulled her down the path of the scholar. True observations became clear to her. "But your eyes are always on Sky. So between the two of you, I will be perfectly safe."

He stepped away from the street, giving her his full attention. "You always reach for your amulet when you're nervous. That was fine in Tien's Landing, but in the city, you'll be marked by thieves."

She didn't care. The amulet had served its purpose. She did not feel like she was balancing on poles now. These observations gave her confidence. "Says the man wearing the jade necklace out in the open."

His hand went to the leather thong that hung around his neck. "This? It's not jade, and a real thief will know it is not worth anything."

"Not worth anything in silver, perhaps, but I've never seen you take it off." She smiled. "I, at least, have the excuse of holding the fate of the empire around my neck. What's yours?"

Zu looked at her long and hard. She thought that he was on the verge of revealing something about the necklace and himself. Then he turned away. "I know where we are going. Don't get lost."

And the amulet said to follow.

* * *

And that had been that. It was the only time she'd mentioned his necklace and it was the only time he'd spoken of it. She'd meant to ask later.

Later had turned into too late.

"Wu?"

She pocketed her treasure. "Sorry. I was just thinking."

Dawn Star didn't ask about what. Perhaps she didn't want to know which ghost or demon was haunting her now. There were so many to choose.

"I'm going to need to go into the caves under the school. You don't have to come, but I won't feel right until I'm certain every ghost is freed."

If a ghost was still bound to this world, she'd send it back to the Wheel of Life herself. It was only right to do so; it was a way to restore balance.

Dawn Star did not back down. "I'll come. I'd like to see where you first met the Water Dragon."

And so they walked towards their master's old home.


	5. Chapter 5

Wu knew where she was going, though she didn't know what she was going to find when she got there.

The waterfall behind the school trickled into the dark, making the caves dank. She paused, kneeling to sift through the ashes of a toppled censer. She'd kicked it over in her fight with one of the many ghosts she'd found here during her first journey; ghosts drawn to her amulet.

Her fingers curled into a fist, trapping the ashes in the palm of her hand. Master Li had been so certain that she would survive. What if the censer had toppled her instead and she'd died by spectral hands in the dark? Where would Master Li and his fool-proof plan had been then?

Her fingers pressed into her palm. If she could imagine one place Sun Li would be sent to be punished, it would be here, under the school where the master before him had died at his hands. A fitting punishment, but -

"I can't believe this was under our school," Dawn Star whispered.

But Dawn Star did not need to see her real father again, in the flesh or not.

Wu stood up, brushing her hands together to rid her skin of the ashes. If there were vengeful spirits down here, she would deal with them. She would disperse them or bind them as she saw fit; and by the Hundred Handed One, if her old Master were down here, he'd soon understand what his brother had felt all those years as Death's Hand.

* * *

Ever since Wu was a child, she loved fighting. It was not bloodlust or a love of competition that drove her; it was the rightness of the sword pommel in her hand, of the lightning at her fingertips, of the ice in her veins, of the power pulsing in every strike.

She leapt aside, landing on her hands first, and then flipping herself back onto her feet. The sand shifted slightly when the ogre she had been fighting fell to the ground and she relaxed. The crowd cheered and she waved quickly, flashing a smile, before jogging off towards the fighter's entrance.

She muscled her way past the student fighters that were waiting for their turn for glory or failure. She nodded at a recently bruised Hapless Han and ignored Iron Soldier, who ignored her right back. Zu was waiting for her near the betting booths.

"I won," she said, not knowing if he'd seen her match or not.

"I would hope so."

She should have expected as much and tuned Zu out. She signaled to the bookie and he nodded, stepping away from the counter for a moment. She paid him a bit of her precious silver to keep an eye out on the house's take. It gave her an edge when she tried to squeeze a bit of extra from Qui. Zu kept talking.

"You were only against a single ogre. I've seen you fight more at once - and without the luxury of a cheering crowd or a giant arena." Zu went on. "And you should wear your hair up nex time."

She almost missed the bookie signaling the house's take. Her hand went to her hair, pushing it out of her eyes. "What's wrong with it the way it is now?"

"I saw you wipe your hair out of your eyes at least three times. That will be a liability in later matches, when your opponents are not strong but quick and clever."

"Thank you for the advice." That made more sense than what she had thought he might be implying and her hair _could_ be a nuisance. But she was not seeking advice; she was still looking for a way out of this dangerous and round-about plan. "Has there been any word from the others?"

"No. Nothing."

Which meant that she had to continue on this path - catering to the whims and desires of her enemies. She chafed at it. Corruption to the left of her, corruption to the right and all she could do was remind herself that she had to do this to save Master Li.

But her quest was not free, so now was the time to collect her winnings.

Zu followed her up the stairs toward Qui's office. They had to cut through the patron's viewing areas, where she was roundly congratulated about her latest victory. Yet through the congratulations, there was one silent spot. Gentle Breezes was in the corner drinking tea. Wu noticed her lift the teapot stiffly and she saw a bruise on her wrist that had been covered imperfectly with makeup.

Zu noticed as well. "I think one person would not mind Judge Fang...disappearing."

She lowered her voice. "There is no doubt that the man is disgusting, but he's the enemy of the Lotus Assassins for now. They need more enemies, no matter how perverse those enemies are."

"The Inquisitor's way seems the quickest way of reaching your Master."

Zu had this way, she noticed, of saying the most infuriatingly true things in a matter of fact way.

"I'll do this my way or not at all." She leaned against the wall, waiting for Qui to finish talking with another new fighter. She kept her voice low when she added, "And I will not dance for the Inquisitors."

He would not stop pressing his point. "But you're still taking the path of the Enforcer."

"Because I know where I stand in the arena, corrupt as it is!" she snapped. A few of the other fighters in the room looked at her, then looked just as quickly away. She flexed her fingers purposefully, calming herself. "I can win the Silver Division without ruining anyone's life."

"Are you sure of that?"

She forced confidence into her voice. "Like the princess, Qui and the serpent need me. They'll let me have my way - to a point."

"But if you have to bend, can you do it without breaking?"

She felt the muscle in her jaw tighten. "I will do what I must to save Master Li - even if it means shattering."

Zu could not contain his agitation any longer. "You don't understand what you're saying."

"I understand that every time Sky tries to contact one of the Guild, they warn him that questions like that bring Assassins. I understand that Kang, who may be mad but isn't short of brilliant ideas, can't think of _one_ way to get the Marvelous Dragonfly into the palace without the Imperial Army blowing us into pieces. I understand that even Chai Ka can't pull celestial strings to get us there." She threw her hands into the air. "But if you have any other way to get us into that palace, I will do that instead."

His next words were quiet but were spoken with such a certainty that it froze her heart. "If you go into the fortress, you will change."

It worried her more when he did not speak fiercely. She closed her eyes, forced herself to keep her hand off the amulet under her shirt. "Even so, I have no choice. I must go there or Master Li dies for sure."

"If he isn't already dead."

"If he isn't already dead," she repeated. "But I hope. Against my better judgment, I hope."

The promoter scurried past her and she followed him, shouting "Qui! Where's my silver?"


	6. Chapter 6

"Was there something there, in the ashes?" Dawn Star asked.

"Nothing. I was just...remembering."

Dawn Star smiled. "You have dirt on your face."

Wu rubbed her face with her hand, and her friend laughed. "You've made it worse. Here, let me."

She had stuck her sleeve in pooled water and was washing Wu's face before she could protest. "That's cold," Wu sputtered.

Dawn Star gave her face one more good scrub. "There. All clean."

Wu dried her face with her shirt. "I don't know if I should thank you for that."

"I most definitely deserve thanks. If we're going to face something horrendous, you can't do it looking like you're some city urchin. What would Mas - what would the Empress think? She can't have the Empire's Champion looking dirty when fighting for justice."

Wu laughed and ignored how Dawn Star had almost said his name. "You're right. I have to be presentable now. What would I do without you?"

So in the dark cavern, she linked arms with her friend and they continued on to the final chamber where she had met the Water Dragon.

And a part of Wu wondered if the past would always find a way to sneak into their daily lives; a darkness ruining whatever light they could gather around them.

* * *

The crowd cheered and screamed as Wu took her bows. She could really get used to this feeling.

"Hey, scab. Give the rest of us some stage," one of the actors hissed. Wu took that as her cue to leave - and collect her fee - and slipped off to the side.

She'd seen Assassins in the crowd, but underneath her make-up there was no way they could recognize her. She imagined they were there to hear the treasonous lines from the play - too bad that she'd gone back to the original script. She hadn't done it out of altruism though; she'd just thought the play had sounded better the original way.

She found Phong and received her payment. He seemed happy that she'd changed the lines back and gave her a bonus for it. "But you shouldn't be in your costume in the street. It's just really not actor etiquette."

Wu ignored him and bowed in thanks. With what she had now and what she would collect from Incisive Chorus, this would be a profitable afternoon.

She craned her neck, looking for Hou and Dawn Star. They'd said they would come and watch her debut. Instead, she found someone she had not expected, waiting for her at the bottom of the steps of the pagoda.

Zu greeted her with his usual enthuasiam. "You are wasting our time with ridiculous distractions."

"How ridiculous is five thousand silver?" she asked. It lay heavy against her hip underneath her clothes.

That elicited a half-smile.; whether it was at her joke or the money she'd earned, she didn't know. "That kind of silver is only a little ridiculous."

"I know. And I didn't have to fight, kill, or sell anyone into slavery to get it," she said pointedly. "Where's Hou and Dawn Star?"

"I didn't see them."

As soon as he said that, Wu was on guard. "There were Assassins here."

"I was watching them. And if they were here for Hou and Dawn Star, they would have found you as well. They would have stopped the play to arrest you."

She was still worried about her friends, but it sounded right. Hou and Dawn Star would show up when they would. "I still have money to collect from the playwright. Let's find him."

Incisive Chorus was more than happy to pay her for her performance. He praised her enthusiastically and gave her more silver.

Zu was less effusive with his praise. "That man is an idiot. Anyone who knows history could tell that you didn't know who Lady Fourteen Flowers was."

She shrugged. "It didn't stop me from getting her lines right."

"It might have made your performance more believable."

"The crowd seemed to enjoy it." She paused, then asked, "Wait, you watched the performance?"

He shrugged. "I have not seen a play for a very long time. And those skits your village did at the yearly festival did not count."

She smiled. She was in a good mood and she was used to his sarcasm now. "Yes, of course. And how was this play?"

"I've seen better."

"Is that so? And where would that be - if not Two Rivers?" she teased.

"At the palace. They had visiting players come for the Empress. There were always guards to watch the players, and there were always Monks to watch the guards."

"Monks?" she asked carefully. He had never spoken so casually about his time in the palace before.

"The Lotus Assassins were the Order of the Lotus before Death's Hand came to power." He seemed to remember where he was and added, "Those players that I saw in the palace - they were better than your troop."

She waited for more, but realized that he was done speaking about his past.

"I would hope they would be better, if they were entertaining royalty," she finally said. "Zu, I'm starving and since Hou's not here, I think I have to live on street fare today."

They walked farther away and found a noodle vendor who had set up seats and tables near the river. The man looked twice at her make-up and then asked her to pay up front for her food. She laughed, glad she was not a professional actor if they were considered that poor.

They took seats closest to the bridge. She pointed at the lights beyond, floating in the river. "It's all wrong. The lights, that is. Do you see? Look at them. Lotuses don't grow in running water. It looks all wrong."

"And how many lotuses did you see in Two Rivers?" Zu asked.

"None. The rivers were too fast, too clear. In fact, the first ones I saw were in the Scholar's Garden - and those didn't seem right either."

"And yet your master named you after them," Zu said.

Her good mood ebbed away. She took a sip of her tea then said, "I assume so."

Zu raised an eyebrow. "You assume?"

"At times, his secrecy was frustrating," she said shortly. "But I will not be the one to question the man who raised me."

"That kind of filial piety is admirable," Zu said. "Especially to one who is not your father."

She laughed; it was forced. "Not my father? Yes, that's true. He only raised me from a baby. He only taught me and trained me. He's not my father, but he's a good man. And even if he wasn't, I think I ..." Her fists curled. "I would still follow him. I have no choice. I owe him my life and I must do anything for his."

"Anything?"

"Anything. Even if I become something I hate and I have to lose everything that makes me myself. It would be the very least I could." She gazed at the water. "For Master Li, it would not begin to be enough."

"I understand."

Wu had not expected an answer from him and certainly not the one he had given her. Again, he fell silent.

They ate without speaking, Wu reflecting on Master Li and Zu thinking - she did not know. But questions came to her and each day it seemed like there was less time... So she asked.

"Is there any meaning behind the name the Assassins have? The lotus? He - " her voice dropped. "Death's Hand kept it in his own way. Why did he do that?"

"I don't understand how that one thinks," Zu said. "I can only tell you why they had it before. We were that the lotus opens and closes at the whim of the sun; as we were to look only to the Emperor."

"As do many flowers," she said.

"I am not done," he retorted.

He looked at the rushing water below them and spoke as if he were reciting something long forgotten. "The lotus is the perfection of the four orders of the natural world: the roots ground it in the earth, it grows in and by means of water, its leaves are nourished by air, and it blooms through the power of the sun's fire."

"The original monks, the ones who served Sagacious Tien, were dedicated to not only combat, but to scholarly, spiritual, and artistic pursuits. They were meant to cultivate the perfection of the natural world in the Emperor himself."

She couldn't help interrupting. "Perhaps Death's Hand missed that history lesson."

He fixed his eyes on her. "He is the master of one lesson, though. He knows that the lotus floats above the mud on calm waters. And when he goes to kill you, you won't be able to use his anger or his triumph against him. His power comes from a dark and still place - and that is why he will walk away with your blood on his blade."

Wu kept her hand away from the amulet that was freezing her skin. "Then I will have to learn the same lesson - quickly."

"Wu!" Dawn Star walked out of the crowd, waving. "Hou and I were waiting for you near the pagoda. When you didn't show up, we were so worried."

She waved back at her friends and they sat down. Soon they were talking about the play and its good and bad points. Wu pushed lotuses and muddy waters out of her mind; they were dark topics for such a good day.


	7. Chapter 7

Wu stopped, taking Dawn Star by the elbow. "It's up there."

That is where the cavern would be with the shrine and the tree and the waterfall in the back. That is where she had fought the Old Master and seen the Water Dragon appear before her. It seemed laughable now that she'd thought she was seeing another spirit that needed to be put down.

She did not want to laugh now.

Dawn Star's hand covered her own; her fingers were cold. "Why are you scared?"

The last time she was here, so many months ago, she might have lied. She might have said that she was not scared, that she was never scared. "I don't know what will meet us in there."

"I don't sense any ghosts," Dawn Star promised.

Wu didn't either, but it didn't stop her heart from pushing against her breast. Her hand went to her throat, looking for an amulet that was not there anymore. "It's not ghosts I am afraid of."

Ghosts she would disperse and gods she would defy, but the silence waited for them in that chamber frightened her the most of all.

* * *

Wu stretched deeply, arms above her head, then rolled her neck. She focused on her stance, her muscles, her breathing. She was only a few fights away from the Silver Division. Everything counted on her success.

She'd picked this empty flyer hold for a reason. If any one of her companions were to ask her, it was because she didn't want her opponents to see her practicing her techniques in the Arena.

It wouldn't be the complete truth, though. She was hiding herself.

She hit an invisible opponent, breaking its invisible neck. She threw ice at nothing. The hair on her neck stood up as she used Storm Dragon on opponents made of air and still she could not forget what Sky had said to her.

Thirty years. That was a very long time.

Intent and need gave her tunnel vision. She didn't notice Zu until he said, "Sky has a hangdog look to him."

Wu didn't stop her practice. "Then you should leave him be."

"Do you know why?"

Zu was too inquiring and he was choosing to ignore the warning tones in her voice. She ignored him back, focusing on finishing her form. She moved into another one and then another, but he stood there, waiting for her to say something. "It's a private matter, I imagine," she finally said, hoping that it would get him to leave her alone. It was not just Sky's privacy she wanted to protect.

"You must be careful of him, Wu."

He rarely said her name. The way he said it now drew her attention like the snap of a fan and she dropped out of her form to face him. "Why? What do you think he has done?"

He stepped out of the edge of shadow. "It's not what he has done, but what he might consider doing."

"What are you - "

"Very few like to be refused - especially those who rarely are."

Wu didn't recognize her own voice, so low and cracked. "You were listening to us."

"As you've said, I was watching him - watching you."

"Sky isn't that petty." The ice started at the small of her back and crept up her spine. Zu spoke the truth recklessly, not caring what the consequences were. Maybe he didn't think there would be any. "So until you have proof - something beyond misgivings and guesswork - Sky is welcome in our group."

He did not voice his disapproval, but she could feel it anyway. Her anger surged, like an ice-choked river after the spring thaw. He dared to disapprove of her decisions when he had been the one skulking around, listening. "You understand that any trust I had in you is gone."

The corner of his lip, where the scar started, lifted in the mockery of a smile. "I never asked you to trust me."

That was true. He warned her away at every chance, a tiger tail twitching in tall grass. Her trust or Dawn Star's faith in him were as worthless to him as a sky map without a flier. So she struck back at a place, the only place, she knew might hurt him. "Your spying on me; there is no honor in that."

The mock smile died and came back as a laugh devoid of humor. "I lost that many years ago."

"And you will not find it again." She turned her back on him. "Not here. Not with me."

She was never good at feeling Zu arrive, but it was always obvious when he went. The hair on her neck slowly stood down and her skin felt less prickly, as she stopped waiting for something that never came.

She hoped no one else would bother her. This wasn't about wanting to be alone; this was about needing it. It had been so easy in Two Rivers. She had time to leave the school and go into the hills or to the river when she needed to clear her head.

Wu began to fight nothing again, hoping to calm herself. Damn Sky for seeing offers she hadn't even known she'd been making. Damn Zu as well. Damn them all for their demands and questions and looking to her for everything.

Couldn't they understand that she was afraid every decision she made would come back to haunt her? Is this what Master Li felt like too, when he was prince leading troops into Dirge? Did he worry about who and how many would be killed? Did his decision to side with the monks and against his brothers weigh on his shoulders constantly? What of his wife and child, traded for Wu's life? Had he ever wished he'd just let her die to save his own family?

Shadows died around her, while the questions whirled in her head.

For each second she felt the weight of her responsibility, it became easier to pull on the power of the amulet and use it to achieve what she desired. She was asked to lead and then they questioned what she did. Yet dissent within the group was easily quelled by a smile or a well-placed question or the tightening of her jaw, depending on who was stepping out of their place. She was making them bend to her decisions instead of allowing them to air their agreements or disagreements. It frightened her; this power she realized was at her fingertips.

That...that was why she had told Sky no. A part of her was afraid that his feelings for her were just an accidental manipulation of the amulet. Another part of her was... another part of her...

Wu closed her eyes, fell into a form that was meant to calm and focus. After a minute, she opened her eyes again and confronted the other part of her.

The other part of her was scornful of a man that could be manipulated with a smile or look. Wu was afraid that was what had told her to say no - the part of her that liked how it felt to pull the jade heart from the dam. It was that part of her that had given Incisive Chorus, that ridiculous man, to the guards at the gate out of exasperation at idiocy. It was the part of her that was impatient at vulnerability or stupidity, because each vulnerable or stupid person was another obstacle in the path that led to Master Li's rescue.

Fear or scorn; either reason frightened her. She couldn't be afraid to use what powers she had because she would need every skill she had to save Master Li. And she couldn't be scornful of her friends, even if they couldn't match her physical strength or will, because to go down that path was much too close to the one that Death's Hand walked.

"Wu?"

She took a deep breath to stop herself from shouting at Dawn Star. "What is it?"

"I came to see...to see if you're alright." Dawn Star stood in the hangar door, on the verge of fleeing. "I felt that something was wrong and wanted to know if I could help."

Wu wanted to laugh. The problems she had could not be helped. "No. I - it's nothing."

"You aren't a very good liar." Dawn Star smiled tentatively. "But if you don't want to talk about it, I understand. I brought some buns for you too. You missed dinner."

Strange how this little kindness made her feel less like a leaf on a river and more like a stone in the middle of the current. "Thank you."

Perhaps she wasn't so far gone yet, to either fear or scorn. Perhaps if she could just remember to remember...

Wu stepped forward, taking the basket from her friend. "I think I've practiced alone enough. Let's find some tea to go with these buns."


	8. Chapter 8

There was the burning tree, still on fire in the light that filtered through the cracks in the ceiling, and the spirit fount glowing like a ghost in the corner. There was the chest that she had raided in a daze after the Water Dragon had spoken to her. It was all as she had left it on the day Sun Li had begun pulling her strings in earnest.

Wu shivered and closed her eyes. There were no good memories here. It had all been fear and confusion that day. First she had been sent into the dark to apprehend a destiny she had not understood until standing on the threshold of life and death and then there had been a series of homecomings that had only took her farther away from her home. The first had found Dawn Star kidnapped and a student murdered; the second had found fliers in the sky and smoke in the air.

Everything had changed so quickly - and all because she had been so eager to 'complete her training.' She had been such a fool.

Dawn Star's hand caught hers. "It is very peaceful here, Wu."

Wu opened her eyes. There was the tree, still living though trapped underground, and the spirit fount glowing like a firefly in the corner. There was the chest that she had gone through after the Water Dragon had appeared. It was all as she had left it on the day she had met him...

That was the one good memory.

* * *

The matches at the Arena were coming quickly again. Even though Tiger Lifts the Mountain was not popular with Kai Lan, she was quite the crowd favorite. But with popularity came problems. She was being recognized in the street and it was getting too difficult to lose Arena fans when she was trying to escape back to her friends.

Qui had become aware of her problems and her desire for privacy. He offered her a room in the Arena's tavern and she had taken it. Qui had also told her that by staying in the Arena, she would lessen her time on the streets. When she'd asked what he meant, he'd said the streets weren't safe for her.

Wu knew why. She had not pleased Kai Lan by killing his right hand man and the lesson she had wanted to teach - that one does not threaten her or her people - did not seem to be taking. She had angered the serpent enough that he had sent hired poisoned hands against her in the Arena, but he had not made an obvious move against her since that day.

He was waiting and so was she.

Since she could not leave, her companions came to her. The Black Whirlwind had become a permanent fixture in the Heart of the Empire tavern - running up a bill in her name while keeping a bleary eye on her.

The others dropped in on her as they could. Dawn Star and Wildflower came after matches with food from Hou. She had seen Silk Fox in the stands, forgetting herself and cheering Wu's victories like any other peasant in the crowd.

She and Sky had even fallen back into their old joking and comfortable ways, as if they had never spoken in private.

Only Zu did not show himself. She wasn't surprised. To strike at a man's honor was almost as dishonorable as what Zu had done to her. Almost.

Wu felt the weight of the air on her today. The humidity made her hair stick to her neck. A rain was coming and she could not wait for it to fall. Perhaps it would give her some relief. Her room, even with her open window, was too stifling.

She picked up the Dragon Sword. Her match wasn't until much later in the evening and she absolutely could not wait another hour in this place. It rang of noise at all hours and the smell of cooking and liquor had seeped into the wood. She could not stand the company of the other fighters and could not lounge in the tavern without being accosted by some fan.

She had to go outside into the streets. Perhaps she could find relief from the heat near the Golden Way. The nobles weren't such arena fanatics as those living in the Market District.

"Tiger!" Qui hurried down the hall towards her. "Where are you going?"

"Out," she said firmly, hand on the pommel of the Dragon Sword. She was hardly unarmed. Couldn't he see that?

"But the streets aren't - "

"I'm going out, Qui." She went for something he would feel. "Or do you want rumors to start about how Tiger is sick in bed? No one's going to stay and wait for the final fight if they don't think I'll show - assuming they come at all."

The promoter's thick eyebrows knit together in worry. "Just be careful. You won't be in any fights at all if you get injured outside the Arena."

She nodded, smiled, and walked away, feeling almost free. What an odd chance, to see the city alone and without an errand to run or a wrong to right.

Wu went to the Golden Way. The heat was no less oppressive up there than it was down near the working districts, so she retraced her steps, wandering past stalls and stores. The sun sank behind the hills around the city and the lantern-lighters came out. The city was so different than the country; a setting sun did not mean that anyone stopped working.

Wu found herself in the neighborhood behind the Arena, full of warehouses, cheap lodgings and even cheaper food. Her stomach groaned and her gaze skipped and hopped like a stone thrown on water, trying to decide what to eat.

She didn't know what she noticed first. Perhaps it was the way the movement of the crowd changed or perhaps it was the scent of something new and dangerous on the air. She wanted to turn around and confront whoever it was falling in around her, making a noose in the street, but there were too many people here and she couldn't get caught up in an incident with the city guards right before a match.

Wu walked away from the food carts and started for an alley. She allowed herself a casual glance and saw that those who followed her were no Assassins. They were poorly dressed, nothing more than ruffians, but there were many of them. They broke away from the crowd and followed her.

The darkness of the alley gave her everything she needed. She ran now, focusing on slivers of light in between buildings, until she found herself in front of a warehouse. The door was open and when she looked inside, she saw that the place was mostly empty, with only a few scattered crates in the corners. It would be perfect for what she planned.

It would be easy to lose them, but the snake need another lesson. Her appearance in the ring would annoy Kai Lan; the death of so many of his men would sting much harder. Let him understand that Tiger had claws.

Wu strode with confidence into the warehouse, just another Arena for her. She stretched, feeling the shadows get weight and form. The bottom-feeders were using the darkness to hide themselves, but they would have to show themselves eventually.

The first man came at her screaming, sword drawn. She felt it only fair to meet steel with steel. His head bounced away in the darkness as she crouched into a lower stance, waiting for the next one to come.

There was no 'one.' The men erupted from the walls like swarm of flies off the back of a water buffalo, leaping, running, converging on her in a mass. She jumped high, spearing one in the stomach, kicking another into the far wall. She reached and grabbed and caught a rafter, hanging there precariously, breathing hard.

There was a solid thump of a bolt in wood right next to her fingers. She swore and swung herself to the next beam, just as the one she had left became a pin cushion. She leapt and swung like the Monkey God himself had possessed her body, while every inch of wood she left behind became spiked like an angry hedgehog.

The Dragon Sword pulled on her left hand and her right shoulder was on fire. Either they would run out of arrows or she would become a reluctant and very dead hedgehog. She weighed her chances on dropping into the midst of them and she would have to make her decision soon because her fingers -

They shouted as she fell. The dirtpacked floor welcomed her with a hearty thud on her back and she leapt to her feet, hoping she could block enough bolts with the Dragon Sword to make an escape.

But the floor where she had landed was clear of men. Zu was in front of her, flourishing his fighting staff. "It seems you've made someone angry."

"They're - "

"Regrouping - and out of arrows." Shafts and arrow heads lay broken at his feet. "But they'll figure out soon enough that there is only one Assassin here."

She pushed herself to her feet. "They're the serpent's men."

"I know. I've been watching them."

"Watching me?" she asked. They were moving in the shadows again, watching them, perhaps wondering why an Assassin was defending their target.

"We could go now," he suggested.

A moment ago, she would have done just that, but her ambushers were confused and she was angry. More than angry; her focus was completely shattered, yet she didn't feel unbalanced. She remembered Smiling Mountain's words. _The Way of the Closed Fist finds the eye of the storm, the center of chaos, and stands there, laughing._

She returned the Dragon Sword to its scabbard. "You can go if you want. I will be staying to finish this."

"And how will your recklessness save Master Li?" he asked.

"This is not for Master Li." A proper storm wouldn't be here for days, but she could feel its beginnings and she began to pull the cold air and lightning down around her. Her breath began to cloud the air. "This moment is mine alone."

He laughed softly, and behind his laugh, she could hear the nervous mutters of the men in the dark. "Then let's finish this quickly," he said, "or you'll be late for your match."

The ice began to fall and its sudden appearance only frightened the men more. Didn't they know who she was? Or had Kailan hired thugs and merely told them to kill a woman? What were they thinking now that they realized their opponents were an Assassin and a fighter who could summon ice from nothing?

Their fear made the air taste like copper and electricity. It strengthened her and she pulled the lightning down now, feeling it racing up her arms to her fingers. "Come," she said under her breath, so only Zu could hear. "Come and see, you fools."

Three rushed at them and three fell, one still twitching from the effects of the Storm Dragon. Again the men rushed out of the darkness, shouting in unison. It was the shouts of men trying convince themselves that running at a more powerful enemy is a proud and brave thing to do.

Wu pulled the Dragon Sword from its scabbard again and stepped away from Zu, clearing a swathe in front of her. Once, twice, she swung overhead until the edge of the blade connected with sinew and muscle. The thug screamed as his arm fell to his feet; she cleaved his head in two before he'd finished his yell. No one could say she liked to watch an enemy suffer.

And she smiled as she cut through another man and another. It was true; she didn't like to watch these enemies suffer. They weren't worthy of the time it would take to torture them.

Too quickly, the ones in front of her were dead, and she turned to see if Zu had any extras she could finish. He was difficult to make out in dark room, but the jangling of the rings on his staff let her ears follow him.

She stepped around the slivers of light, wanting to see more of Zu and the way she fought. She had watched him in battle once before in Tien's Landing, but here he moved much easier, with less caution. Was it because he'd had more practice since leaving the marshes? Or rather was it because he was more comfortable in the shadows of a city?

Each movement was fluid, as if he'd done it a thousand times before. It was a beautiful style and she now wished she'd had the foresight to ask him to teach it to her. Extension, swing, thrust; watching him was pushing her into a focus that she could almost not control.

The last thug hit by Zu's staff was thrown straight at her. Wu leapt into the air, dodging the body, and landed in a crouch. She looked at the man over her shoulder and then looked up. Zu was standing over her.

He offered his hand and she took it. There was blood on her fingers and now on it was on his, blending into his dyed skin. He pulled her to her feet, but too quickly and she stopped perilously short of him, her face and body inches from his own. His closeness stole the air from her lungs, like an unexpected blow from an opponent.

"You're cold," he said finally. He held her hand a second too long before untangling his fingers from hers and stepping away. "Dark places invite trouble. We should go."

"Yes," she said, trying to forget the heat underneath her hand. "And I should like to see Kai Lan's disappointment when I show up for my next match."

That night she defeated the golem so soundly that the crowd had not even had time to begin cheering her name before it had fallen in the sand, shattered at her feet. She smiled and bowed to Kai Lan's box seat. The old snake left while the rest of the city still cheered.

Yet for all her wielding of ice that night in the warehouse, Wu continued to burn. She listened through the thin walls as the other fighters retired for the evening. She heard Pretty Li Li giggling in the hallway and Iron Soldier's low tones. She heard the light footsteps of Doctor An as she visited another injured fighter. She heard the Sung Brothers, one laughing, one scolding, one confused, as they walked to their rooms.

She found herself staring at the ceiling.

Before the fires, her life had been mapped out. She would study in Two Rivers, then take over the school when Master Li allowed her, and she would teach other students there, and she would die. Before the day where everything she'd known had burned, that would have been enough.

Now Wu was aware of muscle and skin, of eyes and lips - and realized that she had been aware since one night's sparring in Tien's Landing.

Somehow, during the day, she had stopped herself from thinking and at night she had fallen asleep so quickly. But here in the dark dorms of the Arena, she could not stop her thoughts of Zu.

She knew that such feelings were natural - but they were also ignoble. Master Li had raised her with more sense, control, and honor than this.

Wu turned on her side and stared out the window at the Imperial Palace, lit up like another smaller moon in the sky. She had to remember why she was here.

The lotus floated over muddy waters on a calm surface. She had to remember that.

* * *

_A/N: Thanks to all for reading. I wasn't sure what the reception would be for this pairing and I appreciate the encouragement I've been receiving. _

_PS - Yes, this story will earn it's M-rating, I promise. _


	9. Chapter 9

Wu knelt in front of the ever-burning tree and its companion shrine. She closed her eyes and waited for some contact, any contact, from the Heavens. It had been so long since she'd had any guidance, months since she'd last seen the Water Dragon bow to her before disappearing. Even Zin Bu had left her.

But surely she deserved an answer after all she'd done? After all she'd been through?

She closed her eyes and waited for an answer.

* * *

Wu sat on the steps outside of the Black Leopard School, staring down at the city. She had no reason to go back to her room at the Arena just yet. Qui and Kai Lan wanted the build-up to her match with Iron Soldier to reach a fever pitch before they were actually allowed to exchange blows. She'd argued ferociously with both of them, but Qui was a promoter first and Kai Lan - well, Kai Lan was a complete bastard. Neither would budge and so she'd been left to her own devices while they stoked a fire around a match that could only have one outcome.

In the meantime, she and her companions still had to eat and have a place to sleep, they still had to have gear, so she'd taken on another odd job. It had ended well enough. She had a new technique. The technique wasn't as honorable as she'd have liked, but neither was Iron Soldier as honorable an opponent as she'd have liked. A few dirty tricks might be called for if she were to beat him and gain the Executioner's favor.

The demon next to her cackled, swinging Wildflower's feet in glee. "That was very productive, mortal. And violent."

Wu had invited Ya Zhen to this task. He'd been useful, though she doubted she would call on his services again. She'd thought that by allowing him out, he'd leave Wildflower alone for a few hours. She realized too late that she'd just strengthened him.

But to be fair, the demon didn't give her a headache with Tho Phan.

"Not one but two demons in the courtyard. I think you impressed them," it said.

The air was heavy and hot. It would storm soon. Maybe not tonight or tomorrow, but soon. "I just wanted their petty squabbling to end."

The demon cocked its head to the side. "I didn't think you'd side with Master Smiling Hawk."

Her clothes were sticking to her. It was uncomfortable; Two Rivers had never been this hot or humid. Even on the hill above the city, she could find no relief. "He made the best offer."

"Why are we sitting outside the school?" The toad demon's red eyes glinted in the coming darkness. "Master Wu the Lotus Blossom sounds very nice, don't you think?"

Her lip curled in disdain. She'd thought she'd have her own school once, but it was ash now. She was not looking for a replacement. "What am I going to do with a martial arts school, Ya Zhen?"

The girl shrugged willow-thin shoulders. "Have soldiers at your command. Use them as fodder against your enemies. What anyone would do with expendable mortals."

"I'm starting to regret inviting you to this task, demon."

"Really?" the demon snapped. "I know why I am here, mortal."

She picked up a stone and threw it down the hill. "Oh really? Enlighten me. What do you think you know?"

"What do you think I do inside the girl all day? Play mahjong with myself?" The demon pulled at a thread on Wildflower's sleeve. "Even when I am not summoned; even when the Guardian is keeping me at bay, I can see you and hear you."

"And?"

"I've had thousands of years to observe your kind, mortal." The demon grinned and Wildflower's smile seemed to have more teeth in it. "You're all so very amusing. You lie to yourselves all the time."

She stood up. "It's time for me to go back to the others, demon. It's time for _you_ to go."

"If I go, who's going to approve of all your black and evil deeds? Not your friends, mortal. Dawn Star has no stomach for what you really like to do."

He was right. Dawn Star would be very disappointed in her right now. But Dawn Star wasn't here.

"Not that it matters what your friends think. There is only one whose approval you seek." Wildflower smiled. "I've seen how you watch the assassin, Wu."

The punch would have been clean and hard. It would have been a punch that could have caved in a child's chest.

But it was a punch that stopped a hair breadth's from the girl.

The demon inside chuckled. "That would have killed her if she weren't already dead."

Wu held her breathe, afraid that any movement would turn into her trying to shake the demon out of the girl. "What is it you want?" she choked out, infuriated at her lack of control.

"What I want? You know what I want and this has nothing to do with that." Ya Zhen manipulated the girl's body, leaning her up against the wall and crossing her arms. "I just like watching the delicious complications you mortals make up. Did you two have an argument? Is he angry with you or are you angry with him?"

She wanted to threaten him with pain to keep his mouth shut or plead with him not to say another word to anyone, but she said nothing. Ya Zhen had the upper hand, holding Wildflower hostage body and soul. Right now, in her state of mind, Wu would lose whatever fight she chose to pick.

She fell back on something Master Li had taught her. When you can't win a fight, walk away. "Go away, Ya Zhen."

"Don't think you can dismiss me as easily as that," he said smugly.

"Don't think you can toy with me without consequences." She closed her eyes and spoke louder. "Chai Ka. We need your help, Wildflower and I. Help us."

The smile tightened grimly. "Fine. I'll keep your secret, just don't - " The demon was cut short. He hissed through gritted teeth. "Chai Ka, you can't get - don't!"

Wildflower cried out and her eyes faded from red to black and then blue.

"_That is more than enough." _Wu did not know if Chai Ka was saying that to her or to the demon he fought inside. His next words were definitely for her though. _"If you have any thought for Wildflower, do not summon the demon again. He grows stronger in this evil city. He grows stronger in the presence of blood."_

"I realized that too late, Chai Ka. It won't happen again." Wu didn't want to ask, but she did anyway. She'd rather hear bad news at once remove than see it in the child's eyes. "Did Wildflower see what...how much does she know?"

"_The demon cannot torture Wildflower and you at the same time. I kept her safe while he was with you, and she cannot know what did not actually happen._"

"But you do," she said pointedly.

"_I see as much as Ya Zhen does, yes."_

"I don't know what I would have done if I'd actually - actually..."

"_But you did not. My path is clear and what I think of your choices, when they do not bear on my task, does not matter."_

Which meant that he didn't approve but was too polite to say so. "Choices?"

"_Sometimes you lose focus on what you are supposed to do. You may be required to make a choice soon._"

She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. "I've made my choice. Master Li is my choice."

"_I would prefer that you say that order or helping the Water Dragon is your choice."_ Wildflower pointed at the ground. _"Look._"

The setting sun threw her shadow on the ground, a tangle of black on the red-hued ground. "My shadow?"

"_Watch it."_

She concentrated on the darkness on the ground. Her shadow twin stood there, hands on her hips. There was no face, but if there were, it would have been sticking its tongue at her.

Then, it changed. Her body was still there, but darkness swirled around the shape on the ground, great black tongues threatening to swallow her form. She turned around to see if she could see the tentacles behind her, but there was nothing. Yet when she turned to the ground again, she could clearly see them swarming around her.

"_That is chaos. It is a proper path, so long as one knows when to use it and why."_

Know when to use it? Master Li had always favored the Open Palm. Even her most basic studies had focused on it. She knew of the Way of the Closed Fist, but only in passing, not in practice. Or so she'd thought. "I try, Chai Ka, but there are times - "

The blue light in Wildflower's eyes flickered. _"I must go. I cannot lend my strength to you when Wildflower needs it more."_

She did not look up from the ground. "Of course, Chai Ka. And thank you for showing me this."

The blue light died and the voice that spoke now was young and female. "Wu?"

"Welcome back." Wu glanced for the last time at her shadow, then took the girl's hand. "Let's get back to the others. I'm hungry."

The girl's small soft fingers intertwined with Wu's. There was not a trace of worry or pain on Wildflower's face and she smiled. "Me too. Let's go."

* * *

When they finally scrambled out of the caves, it was almost dark.

"I'll gather some firewood," Wu told her friend.

"Then I'll get dinner ready."

Wu did not have to do far. She picked up a few pieces of the old pagoda where one of the training scrolls had been displayed. She and the other students had always gone to it for guidance. Now it was ash.

Ash. She'd sat in the silence for hours, listening to her breath and the slow drip of water. Yet there had been nothing.

Where was her guidance? Why hadn't the Water Dragon answered her?


	10. Chapter 10

Wu and Iron Soldier stood in front of Qui, on the same side for the first time in their fighting careers.

"I'm not going to be told what to do by the likes of you, Qui." The ex-soldier shifted dangerously.

Wu nodded. It was perhaps the only time she and the man had ever agreed. "This is absolutely ridiculous."

Qui stood firm. "Management's orders. You two are to be inside the Arena and in your rooms tonight when the Heart of the Empire closes its doors."

"I am not a child," Wu muttered.

"Says you, pup," Iron Soldier retorted. He moved his eyes to the promoter. "But you've never asked this for any other match-up since I've been here, Qui. What's your game?"

"My game? It's that there hasn't been a match like this in years," Qui said. "The last time we'd built up this kind of excitement - well, that was long ago. And when this match happens, it is going to above board! No one is going to be able to breathe a word against the fairness of this match - not anyone from your side, Soldier, or yours, Tiger! Is that clear?"

Wu and Iron Soldier found themselves unlikely allies and tried to convince the man that this was ridiculous and unnecessary, but he would have none of it. It came down to a matter of will - was their will to fight each other stronger than their will to flout the rules of the Arena? Both knew the answer already and grudgingly agreed to their curfew.

"But I am going out today, Qui," Wu declared, "if you're keeping us under lock and key tonight."

Wu covered her face with a scarf, pushed through the doors of the Arena and stepped out into the marketplace. The humidity had not let up. She could feel the storm building, but there was nothing she could do to urge it on its way. She would welcome the rain; anything was better than the oppressive wet blanket that had fallen over the city.

Before she found her friends, she needed to settle her mind. Now that she'd seen the chaos that surrounded her, she tried to feel it as well. She pushed through the crowds, trying to move them with her mind, trying to get them to see and respect her strength before they brushed against her.

If she won the tournament tomorrow, she would have to go the Assassins' stronghold. Her power and skills were rawly powerful enough that she could destroy them without a center, but she knew that if she were to face Death's Hand like this, he would end her without a thought.

She could find the eye of the storm if she just looked hard enough. She'd found it once. She could do it again, but she had to do it soon.

She had to find the center or she would fail Master Li.

Yet the people whirled around her, pushing her this way and that. She could still intimidate her way through the thickest of it, charm her way around the vendors, and dodge the rest, but there was no center in that. She could not find the empty places and make herself be there.

She was still buffeted by the storm, when she needed to be outside of it.

Wu gave up and allowed the crowd to push and pull her towards the hangars at the far side of the river. Her friends weren't all there, but she waited for them. It was a difficult task, to remain calm and patient, when tomorrow would decide whether she could continue her rescue of Master Li.

Finally, her friends and companions were gathered. "I called you together because if I win this fight, I think things will move very quickly. We need to be prepared for whatever happens."

Silk Fox nodded. "Once you win the match and receive the seal from the Executioner, you should go directly to the Fortress. We need to find proof for my father - something that will make him realize that Death's Hand is not to be trusted!"

"I can't agree with this," Zu said. "You don't know the danger you're getting into. You don't know the danger the Assassins represent. Death's Hand is not what he seems."

"What do you mean?" Silk Fox snapped. "You always speak in riddles."

Zu shook his head. "His power does not come from study or skill. He is something darker, and we should not be trying to enter his lair."

"We'll be cautious," Wu said shortly and without looking at him. She had made her choice. She truly had.

Rather than snap back at her answer, he said, "Thank you for listening, but I want more than caution. Neither of you understand what they are capable of."

"It doesn't matter what they are capable of." Her hands worked themselves into fists. "I will go into their fortress if it brings me closer to finding Master Li. Silk Fox, you'll come with me."

The Black Whirlwind bellowed in outrage. "That girl? You'll need a fighter in the middle of a fortress full of Assassins."

"Or someone who knows how to sneak around in the dark," Sky added.

"Or someone you can actually trust," Dawn Star murmured, just loud enough for her to hear.

Wu would rather have anyone else come with her, but she had a feeling that if she found something that might implicate the Emperor - for Wu still believed he may not be entirely innocent of this matter - Silk Fox would not believe her. Better that the princess see for herself than hear a second-hand account from a peasant or thief or a fighter.

"That is my decision," she said. She forced a smile. "Hou, can you make us something to eat? I'd like my last meal before this fight to be extra fortifying!"

"Now that is a good idea. I wouldn't put it past Kai Lan to try and poison you the night before," the Black Whirlwind added. He slapped her on the back, almost knocking her over. "Not that something as little as poison would get the best of you!"

"I'm glad you have such confidence in me," she said, through the stinging, while the others laughed at her discomfort.

* * *

Wu poked at their fire with a stick. It had been the last meal they had all eaten together, but it was one of the few memories she had that was not completely colored gray with loss.

There had been good natured teasing from Sky and a few outrageous stories from Black Whirlwind, that had caused Dawn Star to cover Wildflower's ears before he got too far into the narrative. Later, Dawn Star had made a joke and Lian had almost laughed, before she caught herself.

It had been a good day.

"What's so funny?" Dawn Star asked, her eyes shining in the firelight. "You've been sitting there with a grin on your face for a full minute now."

And rather than try to spare her friend and herself from old memories, Wu told Dawn Star what she had remembered and they laughed together.


	11. Chapter 11

"What shall we do tomorrow?" Dawn Star asked, while she laid out her bedroll.

The light of their campfire was beginning to simmer into a low boiling red, a light that bubbled in the ring of coals. Above them were the stars. Wu could see the Old Man with the Pipe, the Ox and the Cart, and the Scorpion from where she lay. They were familiar sky deities from childhood and like the Water Dragon, they were silent too.

"I'm going into the marshes." Wu hadn't known she was going to say it, but now that she had, she felt better for it. She had come to Two Rivers for a reason. The sooner she completed her task, the sooner she could be free of its chain.

* * *

"_You are losing speed because you are bringing your arm across too high."_

Wu adjusted her form and tried again.

"_Yes. That is it._" Wu finished the form with the Crimson Tears blades and Khana nodded. _"You are a master now. I am glad the Tears have found a worthy owner."_

Wu put the blades away and wiped the sweat from her face with the back of her sleeve. It was not getting any cooler. She couldn't wait for the rain. "And I am glad you decided to come back and watch this fight, since it meant that you would hone my training further."

The other woman looked uncomfortable for a moment. "_I should not have stayed. Coming back to this Arena has made me lose my place..._"

Wu was looking for her place too. "What do you mean?"

"_I only mean that I hope you win against Iron Soldier_." And from the way Khana said it, Wu did not think she meant in the most honorable way possible.

Khana bowed and wished her luck and Iron Soldier made his way onto the sand for his practice time. He ignored her as Khana did him. Wu followed Khana out of the empty Arena.

"_This is where we part for the evening. Qui told me you are under lock and key and I will not eat here anymore._"

"I understand." An attempt at poisoning would have that affect on Wu's dining choices as well.

She bowed low out of respect for the woman, a respect that exceeded most of what she had for her other Arena opponents, and went back into the bath area that was reserved for the fighters.

Wu changed out of her training clothes and ordered one of the slaves to make sure it was clean by morning. She soaked in the baths for as long as her skin could stand it, then longer still, musing on the Crimson Tears. Khana had told her what was engraved on the side of the blades and she could not get it out of her mind. The words danced there, never resting, likes leaves in a storm.

"The innocent are cut down with the guilty; the brave die beside the craven; the blades do not weep for the dead," she whispered in the empty room.

She wondered how many innocent she'd cut down with the guilty. Wu was not stupid enough to believe that she was free from that crime in her quest to free Master Li.

Yet if she were truly on the Path of the Closed Fist, it should not matter to her. If they were not strong enough to defeat her or smart enough to get out of her way, then they had gotten no less than they had earned.

Like the blades, she would not weep for the dead. She had too much to do. She reached for the robe on the edge of the tub and dressed.

When she opened the door of the baths to go into the hallway, she could hear the rain. The entire building was cooler now. She walked up the creaky stairs to her room and stepped inside. The rain pattered loudly against the clay tiles of the Arena and she listened to it through the open window that looked out onto the sand where she would fight tomorrow.

She was sweating. This would not be a rain that took away the heat. It would be worse tomorrow during her match. She watched the sand on the Arena floor being shaped by the wind that stole in through the cracks in the walls, but up here, she felt absolutely -

Wu felt the presence in her room and punched at it before she saw it. She connected solidly with muscle, but missed with the second strike and hit the wall with her fist. She lashed out with her foot but missed again.

Wu went for the closest weapon at hand, ready to fling a candlestick at the assailant. Kai Lan couldn't possibly have been as foolish as to send assassins into her room. That would be stupid.

"Don't be stupid. It's me."

Zu's voice. She put the candlestick back on the table and flexed her fingers, glad that the darkness would hide her grimace. Her knuckles were going to be bruised tomorrow.

"You should focus on your real enemies." His disembodied voice, came out of the darkness like one of the many spirits she'd put to rest. "You will soon have too many to count if you insist on this plan."

"Pardon me if I include a person hiding in the dark in my bedroom on my list of possible enemies," she said. She found the matches lying on the table and lit the candle. Zu squinted against the sudden light and shielded his face, as if he were unaccustomed to such brightness.

"I have a match tomorrow and if Qui catches you in here, I will be disqualified." She hoped that would be the end of it, but he did not go to the door.

"And if I didn't come tonight, you would lose for sure tomorrow. I could see you second guessing yourself while you were training with the Easterner." She was not surprised that he had been watching her and Khana. He continued. "You cannot do that and win your fight - or survive the Assassins. They will smell the indecision on you and come at you like wolves."

"Let them come then. I've killed worse things than wolves." But he was right and she knew it. She just could not shake the feeling of being torn apart by a wind that wasn't even there.

He came closer. And she, curse her muscles, took a step back. He did not smile like she thought he would and his voice was surprisingly kind when he asked, "Wu, what are you afraid of?"

Lying was pointless; he had already seen through her thin bravado. "I am afraid of failing Master Li and Dawn Star. I am afraid of myself, of my weaknesses. I am afraid of changing into one of the people that destroyed my life. I am afraid of it all."

"You know my feelings on going to the Assassins' lair." He paused for a long moment and the room was filled with the sound of rain on clay tiles. When he spoke again, his voice was lower, but no less sure. "But of the many things you are, you are not weak. If you are to succeed, you must not fear your own power. You must not falter and you must take every chance you are given to be ruthless. It is the only way you will survive."

"But I could stay, couldn't I?" She stood straighter, trying to put strength into her words. "I could stop right now, stay in the Arena. I could make a livelihood out of fighting. Dawn Star and I could live in the capital. We'd have enough to be comfortable and I'd never have anything to do with the Assassins. There would be no need for me to go to the Necropolis, not until I died at least..."

Wu continued. "But I can only do that if you - if anyone - could promise me that I won't regret leaving my master to die and my home unavenged."

He shook his head. "No one who knows you could promise you that."

"Then help me, Zu," she pleaded. Part of her railed against the weakness of begging, but the rest of her didn't want her shadow to twist when there was no breeze. The rest of her knew that if anyone could stop her from going too far, it would be him. "You know about them. You could - "

"Do not tell me what I could do!" Zu sounded as he had in the plagued forest, when she'd questioned the purpose of the Assassins. "You don't understand. Even if I did tell you everything I know, I don't know if it would be enough to get you out of their lair alive and...unchanged."

She remembered that she was not the only one who fought demons. "I do understand. And I won't ask for your help again, if you say you cannot give it."

He looked at her, half-accusing, half-appraising, like she had done something wrong, but had done it very well. "There are some days that I am sure I know who you are. And then you go and say things like that and I know that I do not know you at all."

Suddenly wind lashed rain into her room, pulled at the curtains, and tugged at her robe. The candle guttered, throwing shadows everywhere. Wu ignored it, glad that the flickering light was obscuring her shadow which had begun to dance on its own again. She adjusted her robe, her hand pulling at the collar to bring it up over her bare shoulder.

It was a small gesture, but Zu's gaze did not leave her hand until she said his name. When his eyes flicked up, an unreadable curtain fell over his features, but for that one second, she had thought she had seen...

_You must not fear your own power._

Wu stepped forward. She had only used hand to deal hurt and injury to others in past days, but it had done other things once.

_You must not falter._

She reached out to touch his face and he did not move away. Her fingers traced the scar that went from his cheekbone to the edge of his lips.

_And you must take every chance you are given_.

When he closed his eyes, she whispered his name. It was a question and a hope.

"Wu...don't do this."

Wu pulled her hand back slowly. She didn't run, though every muscle in her body screamed to get away from her shame. She didn't look away because that would be weak. She half-bowed as he moved past her and locked the door behind him as he stepped into the dark hall. She leaned against it and took a slow breath.

And she did not cry. That - on her cheeks - that was humidity.


	12. Chapter 12

The light came too soon, as it often did. Wu prodded the embers, which were as reluctant to wake as she was, and then called Dawn Star's name until her friend opened her eyes.

"Should we break camp?" Dawn Star asked after they had eaten a cold breakfast.

Wu thought for a moment. They could leave their things here and it was unlikely that anyone or thing would disturb them. On the other hand, Wu did not wish to be caught in the marsh alone at night by anyone or thing.

"Let's leave it. If we are lucky, we'll have no reason to stay the night," Wu finally said. Her friend seemed relieved.

Wu was apprehensive again. She had not felt this much anxiousness in a very long time. First the cave and now the marshes - Wu stopped the spiral of thoughts before it began. She would deal with whatever was - or was not - in the marsh when she was there. One foot in front of the other, one decision at a time; that was the way she lived now.

* * *

The crowd screamed Wu's name, but up here in the presentation cages, she had eyes for only one thing. She stared at the floating palace and she would keep that vision in her mind until she'd freed her master from that place. From this moment forward, everything else had to be dust.

The storm had done nothing for the heat and the air was a heavy wet blanket. The cages lowered and the stone dragons breathed fire around her, forming steam. Yet she could barely feel any of it; her fingertips were turning blue from a cold that came from within.

The stands reverberated with the stomping feet of the fans and Iron Soldier said something to her as they took their positions opposite each other. She thought for a moment that she heard Dawn Star's voice above the crowd, but it was swallowed by noise and...

She felt it before she saw it. It was what gave Dawn Star chills and caused Wildflower to flinch at shadows when they walked in the city.

It danced on the walls and the ceilings, it twisted like trees in a storm. All these people that were crying out for entertainment, for blood that could not actually be spilled in the Arena, were feeding into the discord of the city.

She saw the chaos moving around and past her, like green and gray and yellow greasy ghosts. Iron Soldier did not seem to feel it, or if he did, he did not mind it. The faceless not-ghosts slid by and by her skin, just out of the reach of her shadow. They did not touch her. Nothing was touching her today.

Iron Soldier barked at her, "Let's finish this, pup!"

"Cub," she said, taking a step back. Her breath curled in the air in front of her, pushing ghosts aside.

The old soldier's lip curled. "What?"

"Tigers don't have pups. They have cubs." She brought up her hands to fight. "And they are born with claws."

The drums sounded, the announcer yelled, and the fight began.

Chaos was there and here and she was in-between it all, moving faster than she ever had before. The currents of discord parted for her, danced with her, but they did not hold her back for a moment.

She was standing over Soldier. His nose was bleeding. First blood for her - that is what the announcer was crying over the noise of the crowd.

She could see it now; the chaos was showing her all the ways this could end if she'd just let herself go, let herself move without thinking. There were hundreds of ways she could defeat Soldier, no matter how he defended or attacked. Gray-dead and green-sick and yellow-craven flowers opened, petal by petal, showing her the way.

But this was going too fast. She'd been at the Arena long enough to know that quick fights, no matter how beautiful in their execution, were not profitable ones and she had been an entertainer too long to take the easy route today.

Also... Iron Soldier hadn't been humiliated enough.

She waited for him to get up and then waited for him to attack. She thought she was leaving Soldier easy attacks, but he missed them all. She slowed herself down to what felt like a crawl and still he missed these openings she presented him. She was starting to get impatient.

Iron Soldier turned and kicked her right in the chest. She flew backwards across the sand, landing on her back. The crowd screamed her name, some with disappointment and some with glee.

She waited again, her back in the sand, catching her breath. She had seen Soldier fight before and knew that he liked to get close for the finishing blow. When his foot came at her, she grabbed it and twisted as hard as she could. He fell next to her and she rolled away.

Wu got to her feet quickly and she waited for her opponent to rise. The crowd could not know, not even the ones in the close seats, but Wu had watched Soldier for weeks now and she could see that when he got up, he was fighting not to favor his now injured ankle.

She kept her guard lower than normal, leaving him a gap near her ribs and one on her chin. He caught her on the chin with his fist, drawing blood.

"This is bad even for you, Tiger," he said. A triumph danced in his eyes, but she saw doubt there too. His mind was quicker than she thought.

"Can't you tell, Soldier?" She took a second to wipe the sweat dripping from her nose. "I'm trying not to embarrass you."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that when you lose this title to me, I do not want people to whisper that the Guild had you poisoned or that old dogs are doomed to lose." She smiled, shifting her weight and her guard. "I will not have my victory look bad."

Crushed pride and self-doubt warred in his stance. She had hurt him worse than if she'd shattered his ankle bone instead of just twisting it and her only weapon had been the truth.

Soldier yelled inarticulately and threw himself at her. She stepped aside, resisting the urge to kick him in the backside. Instead she pushed him in the back, releasing Storm Dragon from the palm of her hand. Soldier froze as the lightning danced inside him and she finished with a leaping elbow to the back of his head. He slumped to the sandy floor, beaten.

She waved at the crowd for one last time and looked up at the open sky above the Arena. She could not see the palace there, but she knew it was near. She was one step closer to it.

Wu let the other fighters congratulate her as Dr. An pushed past her to attend to her unconscious opponent. Pretty Li Li hissed an insult at her as she rushed to her lover's side.

Qui was happily counting the money she had just earned the Arena when she finally made it to the promoter's area. He grinned when he saw her and tossed her a satisfyingly heavy purse without any prodding on her part.

"Thanks, Qui." She shook it again to hear the sound of the coins.

"Would you like to hear about your next opponent?" he asked quickly. "I have had the good fortune to run across a woman from the Prosperous East who - "

"Not now, Qui." _Not ever, Qui_, she wished to add, but she didn't. There might be some day when she needed to return to the Arena and she'd found it an enjoyable source of income.

"Tiger."

Wu had only spoken him to once, but the way his voice scraped through the air made her hair stand on end. She turned slowly, though all her instincts told her to strike fast, hard and to not stop striking until he was dead.

Even in the well-lit Arena, he gathered shadows around him like extra clothes. People were suddenly interested in everything but the two of them. No doubt if they were asked what was said and who spoke to who, they would develop sudden forgetfulness. Such was the power of the Assassins in this city.

"Your victories are impossible for the other fighters to ignore. You are master of the arena, the ground where Executioners are born." He held out a stone seal. "Take this. You may enter our Fortress with it and begin your training."

She held it in her hand. It would be easy to dash it to the ground and denounce everything he stood for, but Master Li was waiting for her. "And the Fortress is where?"

"At the far end of the Necropolis." The brief smile he gave her had no humor in it. "If you cannot make it through the Necropolis, then I will have misjudged you. And that would be a pity, Tiger."

He walked away. Assassins did not wish for a person's luck; they did not believe in anything but the Emperor.

Wu went up to her room to pack. She placed the seal in her bag and pulled a scarf around her head, so that she wouldn't be recognized in the streets.

Crimson Khana was standing at the door when she turned to leave. "_It's true that_ _you're going to them, then?_"

Khana was not a typical city resident. Perhaps in the East, they did not teach their citizens to unsee things seen, unhear things heard. It was good that the woman was going home; Wu did not think she would very long if she stayed in the city. "Yes. I must. I made a promise."

"_If I had known, I might not have given you the Tears._"

"They will never be used for the Assassin's service." It would be an easy enough promise to keep; the Tears were beautiful and strong, but in a pinch, she would use the weapons she knew best.

The woman nodded, satisfied. "_I do not know you well, Tiger, but I wish you luck._"

Khana left and Wu covered her face, set to leave Arena for the last time. The hoi polloi fell for her simple disguise and she cut through the still excited crowds, making her way back to her friends.

The others were already waiting for her in the hangar, near the hotel. Kang had set something bubbling in the corner and it looked like Silk Fox and Sky were arguing. Dawn Star smiled when she saw Wu. Behind her was Zu.

Wu knew she should have the sense to be ashamed for being so forward last night, but she didn't feel the heat of shame in her face. Perhaps she'd used ice for so long that it had gotten into her brain and dulled her honor. Perhaps she was shallow, like the water in Two Rivers. Perhaps she was just tired after a long sleepless night imagining a floating prison in the sky.

Thoughts of an imprisoned master all but dissolved when he looked at her. The Water Dragon save her for a fool.

The princess brought her back to her senses. "So things are looking up. You've gained the favor of the Lotus Assassins," Silk Fox said triumphantly, as if she'd become champion of the Silver Division herself.

"And after we find the evidence against Death's Hand, you will take us to the palace to find Master Li?" Dawn Star asked.

Silk Fox's eyes crinkled at the corners; no doubt she was smirking underneath her veil. "Oh, I promise, little Dawn Star. After we get what I want from the Lotus Assassins, the palace is the first place we will go."

"Before you two begin making plans into the next year, perhaps you should let Wu rest?" Sky suggested. "Or at least let her put her things away."

Sky could always be counted on to lend her a hand, when she didn't think to defend herself. Wu headed up to her room, while the others waited for her. Well, all waited for her but one.

"I saw what you did to Soldier!" The Black Whirlwind said as she walked up the stairs to her room. He could barely fit in the narrow stairwell. "That's how we used to do it in my day. Gave the people a show, even if your opponent wasn't worth the sand you were grinding him into."

"I did what I could," Wu said. She opened the door to her room. It had been kept exactly as she had left it. Now, along with being untidy, it was musty as well. She dumped her things on her bed and walked back downstairs.

The mercenary followed her. "Too bad you can't keep going right for the top. I would have loved to see Kai Lan's face when you took the rank of Champion."

When Wu stepped out into the flyer hangar, Silk Fox began speaking again like she hadn't even left. "Now that you have permission, there won't be any trouble entering. It's only after we have the evidence against Death's Hand that there might be a problem."

Wu wished she did not have to have Silk Fox with her, but her tirades and her stubborn insistence that her father was not behind this made it all the more important that the princess be present when she learned about the truth about the Emperor.

"I can take care of myself," Wu said. There was not much light in the hangar, but she watched for her shadow all the same. Had anyone but the demons seen it twisting when there was no wind?

"You don't want too much fuss," Silk Fox lectured, like they were going into a teahouse. "You'll only bring the place down on yourself."

"Sagacious Zu has knowledge of the inside. At least you seem to," Dawn Star added, turning to address her next question to him. "Where...where is he?"

"He was right behind you." It sounded stupid to her as soon as Wu said it.

"And they're about to close the hotel for the evening. Why would he leave so suddenly?" Dawn Star wondered.

A few quick questions and they realized none of them had seen him leave, though they all agreed he had been in the hangar when Wu had gone into the hotel.

"You are close to entering their lair," Kang said suddenly. Kang spoke about their plans and companions so rarely that everyone was immediately listening. He looked up from his cauldron. "He was an Assassin long before he ever met us, Wu."

Her stomach dropped and she felt hollow. She could not argue with what Kang was suggesting. It was a reasonable assumption to make and there was no reason for Sagacious Zu to stay after they - she - had chosen to ignore his advice and there was every reason for him to leave.

"Why are you surprised?" Lian sniffed behind her mask. "You should be more careful of who you trust."

"If I did that, none of you would be here." Lian's eyes widened with fury, but something in Wu's flat, dead voice kept the princess from answering. So that was the power of discord, she thought.

"If Zu has turned on us, we should move quickly," Lian said, recovering from her shock.

"Zu would not turn on us," Dawn Star insisted. Her voice was clear and strong. Wu wished she could feel as certain.

Wu went to the stairs that led to her room. "We're not going through the Necropolis in the middle of the night. If he has returned to the Assassins, we will know soon enough. Even if he has not, he could still be caught in this city of Assassins. They will not be gentle with him either. If you believe they will come, you - all of you - should leave while you can."

They did not go; not even Silk Fox, even though she insulted Zu's cowardice loudly and at length before going to her room.

Later someone came to her door and Wu could tell from the timid knocking who it might be. She wasn't surprised when it was Dawn Star who came in her room. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Of course."

Dawn Star took a deep breath. "Do you truly believe that Zu left us for good?"

"There is no reason to suspect otherwise." Wu stared at the ceiling. She looked for pictures in the cracks. It was easier than looking at her friend.

"Why is that?" Dawn Star asked heatedly. "He could have been caught. He could need us now. Why do you not trust him?"

"Because he hasn't given us a reason to."

"He helped us in the marshes," she countered.

"Sure enough. After I threatened him and impugned his honor." Wu waved at the thin walls that separated her room from the others. "But if it makes you feel any better, the rest of them haven't given me any reason to trust them either."

"They are our friends," Dawn Star said uncertainly.

"I did not say that they weren't." She did not raise her voice, could not muster any emotion. She'd worked very hard to kill anything she might have harbored during her long night alone and the lightning of feeling she'd felt in the hangar had iced over at the very real possibility of betrayal. "You must understand - people will always leave us. They may leave us by choice or not, but in the end, they will all leave."

"Even you?" Dawn Star asked fiercely, daring her friend to agree, afraid of the answer she might receive.

"I have the potential for disappointing you most of all," Wu said flatly. She turned on her side to face her friend. "Though the Water Dragon knows I will do everything in my power not to. You're the only one I have left, Dawn Star."

Dawn Star looked both troubled and relieved by her statement.

Wu realized she wanted to tell her friend everything. "Is it wrong of me to wish that the Assassins have found and tortured him? At least then it wouldn't be a betrayal he chose."

Dawn Star knew her very well and answered the questions she had not asked with words."If he is taken, that is not your fault. And even though you two have argued in the past, you have argued worse with Lian and I. That would be no reason for him to leave us."

Her friend sat on the edge of her bed and took her hand. "But if he left to go to them, then that was not your fault either."

Wu squeezed her friend's hand. The tears were frozen at the corners of her eyes. "Dawn Star, I haven't done what I should."

"What do you mean?" Dawn Star looked at her carefully.

"I've been selfish."

"In what way?"

But she could not say the next words._ My eyes were fogged, my will was dulled. And for a moment, I wanted him, Dawn Star, more than I wanted to save Master Li._ By the Wall of the West, she didn't care about her own disappointment, but she didn't want to see it in Dawn Star's eyes. Her friend's faith in her was the last pillar she could stand on now. So she lied. "I should have destroyed Fang's reputation - we would have gotten to the palace that much faster. Master Li could be hurt or dying and we've wasted so much time."

"We did what was right," Dawn Star said firmly. "You would not bow to Assassins and your fights in the Arena would have made our whole school in Two Rivers proud. Master Li, no matter where he is, cannot chastise you."

Dawn Star did not go back to her room. They lay in the small bed together like they had as children. They did not giggle and talk into the night as they had in Two Rivers, but Dawn Star's presence comforted Wu.

She almost felt safe that night.


	13. Chapter 13

The gate that Yung had guarded was broken and rotting. Wu could smell the swamp from here.

"Do you think there are still bandits in there?" Dawn Star peered beyond the gate, not quite going through.

Wu swung the Dragon Sword at the long grass that poked out of the marsh and into Two Rivers. "No. There's no one for them to rob within a hundred miles of here."

Dawn Star smiled. "Do the weeds offend you?"

"No mercy for invaders," Wu countered, swinging harder to make her point. Green blades flew into the air and showered down around them, a strange green rain..

Dawn Star stepped over the threshold and into the marsh. Wu trimmed the area around the gate some more until Dawn Star called out to her. "We're wasting time, Wu!"

Wu reminded herself that she'd chosen to do this and she stepped over the threshold. It was time to put some ghosts to rest.

* * *

Wu and Lian smelled of dusty death when they finally made it to the Assassin's Lair in the Necropolis.

"Who would have known that so many of the living were in this graveyard?" Lian had said after they'd put the pyromancer woman down. But the dead were a nuisance too and they'd had to fight their way through too many ghosts. It had taken half the day to reach the lair and Wu was impatient now. Their goal was just steps away; she could see the door to the tomb just beyond the bend in the dirt road.

Shadows moved and created a form she had memorized weeks ago. She froze, gripping Lian's arm tightly.

"What is it?" the princess asked crossly, no doubt not liking to be handled so roughly by a peasant. Her complaint was not loud, but Zu heard her nonetheless. For a moment, he looked at them and then he was gone, eaten by shadows.

"What was that about?" Lian asked, rubbing her forearm. "You nearly pulled my arm off."

It could not be an accident that she saw Zu. He would never be so careless.

Why had he wanted her to see him? What was his plan?

"Wu? Wu." She looked to the princess. "For lack of better words, you looked like you saw a ghost."

"That's exactly it," Wu said dryly, covering her reaction with a lie. Lian had never trusted Zu and she would think twice about entering the fortress that he had entered before them. Wu would not waste more time though.

_What if, what if, what if_, echoed in her head with each footstep as they walked towards the entrance. Each step was forced; she did not want to risk herself to the evil she knew was underground, but she had to if she ever wanted to see Master Li again.

They trod the creaking wood of the pagoda's stairs and opened the heavy doors. The room had the air of something had not been disturbed in years, yet in the floor was the place to put the seal. Wu did so and the stairs opened for them and the dank smell of caves drifted up.

She thought she heard a faint scream as well.

"Shall we stare at it all day or are we going in?" Lian asked.

After spending so much time with the princess, Wu had realized that Lian's attitude became more self-righteous the more unsure she was. It said much about her upbringing, but her attitude still didn't rankle any less.

_Is he down there?_ her traitor self wondered, not half as frightened as it should be. Her traitor self was anticipating this. Her traitor self was an idiot.

The stairs were first wooden then stone torn out of rock. She paused on each step, allowing her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Shadows were deadly here.

While she waited to feel comfortable in the dimness, she listened. Lian - she couldn't say that name here, couldn't even think of her as Lian if they didn't want to give themselves away - was just behind her, almost breathing on her neck.

"You have come." A man in a red mask and dark robe stepped towards them. "But I was not told there would be two."

Wu bowed, erring on the side of caution, and told the story that she and Silk Fox had concocted. "I have brought my slave. No one said I could not."

The Watcher did not seem displeased. "That is fine. We have uses for slaves."

As he escorted them to the Hall of Initiation, the Watcher talked. He did more than talk, he was forthcoming about every plan of the Assassins. Wu was most interested in the golems.

"Why does Death's Hand need golems? Who would dare oppose the Emperor?"

"There are those who think that the Emperor must serve the will of the people, but they are traitors in disguise. His glory is our glory," he said pointedly.

Wu felt Silk Fox stiffen at her side. This was not what she wanted to hear, but maybe she would now learn what her father was capable of and what others would gladly do in his name.

Wu was not comforted when the Watcher laughed after she asked if the Assassins used bodies harvested from the Necropolis. "You will be trained and learn everything you need to know of that in the coming days."

Even with Wu's training, she had difficulty seeing in the dark, but the Watcher led them easily through a passage filled with green light. It shimmered on the slick walls ahead and she could hear the crackling of torches. They left the claustrophobic passage and entered a huge chamber.

Truly, this was a tomb for an Emperor. The grand staircase that led to the Hall of Induction below was intricately carved. Wu was almost glad that it was not being used as a tomb; she did not think that the Assassins appreciated it, but at least she and Silk Fox could see how beautiful the afterlife might have been for the Emperor.

"This is where your training begins. You will find Master Gang at the end of the hall." The Watcher began to step away to go to his post.

Wu stopped him with a question. "Did anyone come in here ahead of us?"

The mask hid his face, but he could not conceal the sneer in his voice. "Only the most skilled of our number could enter this place without me knowing. I am the Watcher."

"'Did he see anyone come in here ahead of us?'" Silk Fox repeated, as the man left them. "What was that about?"

Wu was lost in thought. She did not necessarily believe the Watcher. But if Zu had wanted to betray them, surely he would have told the Watcher immediately and the Assasins would have set upon them as soon as they'd entered the tomb. Inquisitor Jia and Death's Hand wanted the amulet desperately. They wouldn't play cat and mouse with her for the sake of fun. Would they?

Wu's musings were broken when she and Silk Fox were met by Assassin Acolytes at the bottom of the stairs, acolytes whose pride outweighed their sense. Wu was not about to allow them to intimidate her and she doubted that humility was all that prized in this place. The princess and the peasant happily accomodated them in their desire for a fight.

It ended in quick blood and the Acolytes slinked off. Wu cleaned her blade while Silk Fox looked down her nose at her. "You took off his head."

"It made my point," Wu said, putting her sword away.

"Was that supposed to be a joke?" Silk Fox looked down at her clothes. "The blood _sprayed_. Give me some warning next time."

Wu's skin prickled in the damp air. She thought she had heard something, the scrape of stone on stone perhaps. She tried to look as if she was simply a warrior checking her equipment after a skirmish. Then she felt the spy behind, the one who was using stonework and shadow as concealment.

Concealment was not the same as cover, though, and it would afford their hunter no real protection. She pulled her sword again and swung, turning to face the one behind her.

Sword met staff, but the sound was swallowed in the dark.

Her hunter was Zu. He looked very right here, in this evil place, and it made her stomach turn. Zu stepped back, lowering his staff and she did likewise, though she did not lower her guard. She remembered that much at least.

Wu held up her hand before Silk Fox could speak, before she could ruin anything.

"You have come to the realm of the Assassins and you already have enemies. You should not have come here at all. This is my realm, where my demons hide," he said quietly. "You will be forced to see them."

She took a breathe, knowing that it would shatter her facade of calm. Wu asked, "Why did you come here?" when what she wanted to ask was _why did you leave me?_

He answered her question with a question. "Are you certain you are ready for what you will learn here?"

"Yes," she said, forcing her confidence. "I told you before. Whatever it takes to free my master."

He stepped back, melting into a shadow. She could barely see his form in the darkness. "We have discussed much in our time together, but not everything. I left some things buried but now you have descended into their level."

"Nothing can stay buried forever, Zu," she insisted. "We saw that at Tien's Landing."

The darkness spoke. "And yet, at the end, Tien's Landing was buried again."

"Then come here if you have no business with the Assassins?"

"I will give you that answer when I see how you react to this place." And then he was gone.

"Why did you hesitate?" Silk Fox asked. "You should have let me kill him. In fact_, you_ should have killed him."

Wu ignored her. Whatever Zu's reasons, he had not betrayed them. Didn't Silk Fox see that that was enough for now? Zu was still the best hope that they'd find the princess' evidence and a way out of here alive.

But Silk Fox would not let it go. "You allowed him in our group, knowing who he was. Now he is here and he can ruin everything. Next time you see him, don't hesitate to strike."

"Or what, Fox?" Wu asked.

"Or I shall strike for you." And the princess sheathed her sword and walked away.


	14. Chapter 14

The marsh was warmer than Wu remembered, but she couldn't say she remembered a lot from the last time she was here. She'd been so focused on rescuing Dawn Star from the idiot son, blinded with his own importance, that she only remembered the blur of cattails and the sound her feet made wading through the water.

Now she had the chance to consider leeches and water snakes and feel each uncomfortable squish of the water soaking through her boots. It was not pleasant.

Dawn Star frowned. "To imagine that I might have preferred being stuffed in a sack..."

Wu swung the Dragon Sword idly, cutting swathes through bamboo and swampweed. "I think it would depend on the company."

Now Dawn Star laughed. "Oh really?"

"Certainly. I'm sure there are plenty of young women, low-born and high, who wouldn't protest too much if, say, Sky decided to bundle them in burlap and trek them through a swamp - so long as there was a very private thief's lair at the end of the journey."

Again Dawn Star laughed and that was another difference between the first time she was here and the last. There'd been no Dawn Star, no laughter. Only the tight fear in her stomach and -

This was not fear, just a shock she should have been prepared for. Just a ruin that crouched on a small hill rising out of the muck and water. It was just enough land for someone to swing a staff without slipping in mud.

Her hand went to the amulet around her neck. That was the same, even if the stones weren't, even if there were skeletons now where man had fallen.

The caves were to the north and the west from here. He would not have made his home in that direction. "This way."

Dawn Star followed her silently. There was again only the sound of feet splashing in the water and the blur of cattails.

* * *

Gang had, for once, given her useful information. Now she had a plan and the pieces were falling into place, like well-rolled dice. The golem room would be empty tomorrow and all Wu had to do was overload the controls with phoenix oil. Then she would stop the shipment of slaves coming in, clear the main hall, and wait for Shin to come and inspect the slaves that would never come. The only one for him to inspect would be her, and she would not be found wanting.

As she took the steps down from the machinery, one at a time, she noted that Silk Fox was ahead of her even though Wu had told her many times to stay back. She opened her mouth to call out, but then there was a small noise, stone on stone, and Zu was in between them.

Silk Fox kept walking - she hadn't seen him yet - and Wu froze, her mind telling her to step back and the traitor inside telling her to go forward. The traitor was shameless _and_ stupid.

Zu was not here for her though. "My own demons distract me in this place, but I have no love for your new master or the master above him. If you kill one, why not two? Distractions are a key to weakness in a target. If you look to the future Master Gang can have his plans come crashing down on him..."

Wu turned her head to see if Silk Fox had realized she was alone and he was gone.

Two seconds too late and the woman was at her side. "What's the matter with you? We can't wander around here alone; they'll pick us apart!"

"I've thought of something," Wu said.

_We are all killers here, plain and simple. _That is what Guang had said to her. Wu could not really disagree anymore. She had killed many people, but this is the first time she had so callously planned someone's murder. She couldn't pretend it was necessary, but it felt right.

She went back and positioned the golem above the walkway just so, just as she had seen when she'd first entered the area. As she did so, she wondered if she was merely assisting Zu in some plan of his own, a plan that wasn't as simple as killing all the Assassins in this fortress.

In the meantime, she had a spirit shard to create.

Unfortunately, Silk Fox would not let leave without freeing the men and women who were meant to be made into golems. Not after she had heard what was being done with them. "They use people, Wu. My people. My father would never allow this!"

A piece of ice through the throat of the guard killed him quickly. Wu observed how cadaverous the slaves were. How did the golems 'live' on such weak spirits as these people had?

A man thanked them then asked, "But how will we escape?"

Wu frowned. "We have freed you. That was more than enough."

"We'll die if you don't help us," another man pled. "There is an Assassin at the machine. She will slaughter us once she sees we are free."

Wu felt the impatience crawling in her blood; cold worms in her veins. Perhaps that is why she said, "Then maybe you don't want freedom as much as you think. I recommend you go now before someone comes to relieve her."

Silk Fox glared at her and unsheathed her sword. "You are a fool."

"Who's the fool? You're risking our lives to save these people. If we are discovered, you will never have your proof," Wu said.

"_These_ people, Wu? My people. Your people, too." Silk Fox led the ragtag group out of the cells.

Wu followed. Silk Fox was brave and Silk Fox was smart but she was ridiculously outmatched in a fight with an Assassin. Wu couldn't have a princess of the Empire murdered in a graveyard, she thought grimly. And the citizens would die of horror themselves if they knew their beloved Imperial princess had perished in that outfit. So another Assassin died.

"I will lead them into that second level we found," Silk Fox suggested. The men stood back from them in awe. "I think they could find a way to escape from there. Do you think you can handle a corpse on your own?"

Wu ignored her, adjusting the levers and taking them to the second floor. "I'll be back for you shortly."

As soon as she entered the catacombs, Wu felt ill at ease. The Necropolis was not exactly inviting, but she had never felt this kind of focused spiritual malevolence.

Stone on stone again and she heard Zu's voice. "These tombs hold spirits from a time when the Empire nearly fell. Chaotic and powerful, they hunger for revenge. I'm sorry, but I must be sure of who you are."

She'd dispersed numerous spirits by now, but the one that formed before her had a power that she'd never felt before. For the first time in a long time, she took an involuntary step back.

"Zeng Sai knows you! Knows your meddling scent! Zeng Sai will destroy you! Destroy it all!" it roared.

Wu reached for her sword on instinct, though she knew he was only a spirit. It seemed more substantial than the other ghosts she'd vanquished and it was so tall that it would have dwarfed the Black Whirlwind. Could a man possibly be that large in real life? Or had his hatred increased the power and presence of his spirit over the centuries?

She raised her hands to block the strike of its ghostly sword, but the force of it knocked her into the stone wall. "Meddling monk!" the spirit cursed, eyes flashing red. It raised his sword for another blow.

Wu rolled through its legs, spun around and kicked it in the back. The horselord cursed at her for her dishonor, but she had been mimicking Assassins for days and still remembered her work in the Arena. She had no honor down here, yes, but that was because there was no mercy in this place.

Its years of death had not made it any smarter. She learned quickly to dodge the slow swings and kicks and retaliate with strikes to its back as she passed through and around him. The few times that she was slow, though, found her thrown into sharp rock or landing into sarcophagi.

Wu lost her temper and pulled on focus that she was perilously close to not having.

The ghost of Zeng Sai paused when it saw the Toad Demon towering before it. Good. She smacked him across the jaw with her webbed hand and it dissipated into the air.

Wu became herself again, falling to her hands and knees to catch her breath, trying not to feel like her tongue was meters long. She did not look up when she felt Zu's shadow flicker at the corner of his vision. "Why?" she gasped. She hated transformations, hated the weakness it caused.

"So many people are not what they seem to be. After all I have seen, I had to be certain."

"You pitted me against a legendary Horselord!" she cried, striking her fist against the ground. It was such a useless hit it barely disturbed the dust on the ground. "Are you done with these games? Or must I fight the spirit of Emperor Tien to prove myself?"

"Yes. I'm as certain as I can be about who you are." Zu stepped back, hiding in the darkness.

Her fury froze her. All of this, all of what she'd gone through and _he_ did not trust _her_? "Putting a ghost down proves my trustworthiness? You should have followed me into the Necropolis. You would have known so much sooner."

He didn't answer her question, but only said, "I had to be certain."

"That is not an answer!"

Zu ignored her. "A shard made from Zeng Sai's corpse will be pure chaos. It will cripple the Jade Golem and those it commands. Once you are finished with it, present it to your master. Then you will gain access to the inner chamber and the information you need to go to the palace."

Her hands balled into fists on her knees. Master Li. This, all of this, was for Master Li. "Then after the inner chambers, you will come back to the hangar? Dawn Star is worried."

"...I will not be leaving."

Her head snapped up on its own and she searched from his in the darkness. "What do you mean you won't be leaving?"

"I will make that plain soon enough." His voice lowered and the shadows became darker. "This fortress holds many secrets. Some are valuable, some are dangerous and some are hidden because the dark is where they belong."

Wu heard stone scrapping on stone and knew he was gone. She waited a moment, catching her breath, gathering her focus, trying to make sense of what just happened. Then she pushed herself up and carried on.

Wu broke the stone tomb open with a kick and the remnants of Zeng Sai's body spilled out onto the ground. She'd now descended to the level of a grave robber. She hoped Zu - and Master Li - appreciated it.

And yet, as she lugged the foul remains through the catacombs, she could not stop thinking.

_I won't trouble you much longer._

A/N: Thanks everyone for hanging in there during my long hiatus. I didn't forget you and I really appreciated the feedback, the favs and the encouragement while I was sorting a few RL issues out. I hope to update quite a bit more in the coming weeks, but first - vacation! Luckily long waits in airports will give me a chance to brainstorm.

PS A small wild rat can squeeze itself through a hole through the size of a quarter. This fun fact is brought to you by living in NYC!

* * *


	15. Chapter 15

_I won't trouble you much longer._

Short words thrown away. Wu should have let them disappear into the shadows but judgment had not been her strong suit recently.

Stone on stone. She knew the places where she heard stone on stone but only in the golem room had it been so obvious where he might have appeared from and that was the only room that was empty at this hour.

Wu felt a short pang of fear as she ran her hand over the bricks. She'd left Silk Fox asleep on the pallet in their cell and hoped that the woman did not awake to find her missing. And if she did wake, she hoped Silk Fox had the sense to stay in their room. Wandering the halls of this place was ludic-

Wu froze at a sound, realized it was a rat - not the big ones that lived here, but the normal sized ones that lived everywhere. It skittered along the wall in the darkness and she watched it carefully.

Perhaps...she stilled herself, focusing, blurring, hoping it would conceal her from the animal long enough - yes. It was sniffing the air, more slowly than it ever would in real life, and slipped inside an impossibly small opening between the floor and the wall.

Wu let herself breathe normally, blood rushing in her head when the world sped up to normal. She crouched down, following the crack with her fingers, until the seam in the floor met the nearly invisible seam in the wall. The only thing that ever betrayed this secret passage was the sound of stone on stone.

She knew there was an opening from this side of the wall; she only had to find it. After what seemed like hours of meticulously pressing her fingers against depressions and protrusions in the rock, the door opened.

This passage was far away from the marsh outside of Two Rivers but just as damp. A moment of sadness passed over her. This passage, this place, was very far away from everything.

She paused, collected herself, and carefully constructed a flame in her palm. She had to take care with it; on this journey, fire never came to her as easily as ice and she hadn't taken the time to practice its power. Several times it went out when she was more worried about the placement of her feet then whether or not she could see.

These caves were not like the ones used by the cannibals. There was no room here for sudden movement or quick retreats. Should someone come at her from behind or ahead, she would be trapped.

Again she wondered why she was doing this and again she reminded herself that Zu would never stand still long enough to answer a simple question. If she was going to get an answer, she would have to follow the snake into its den.

_I won't trouble you much longer._

The flame wavered. She swore that she would have her answer this time, no matter the consequences.

Again the flame in her hand moved, but it was not from lack of concentration. The faintest breath of air made it dance between her fingers. Wu dropped low and let the fire die. The light, however, did not leave her. It danced on the curve of the stone ahead of her. She moved cautiously around its edge.

The path opened up into a large cavern. Half-hewn rock had been abandoned by stone-cutters at some stage in the tomb's construction. In the middle of the cavern, a fire burned without smoking and, next to it, was Zu.

Wu had not expected to find him sleeping. She watched his shallow breathing, wondering what she should do next. It was quickly decided for her.

Earth doused the fire and she realized that in the sudden dark, he had no idea who she was. She stepped away from the middle and tried to put a wall at her back. She thought she saw him in the shadows, but before she knew it, he was behind her. He had her by the shoulder, but she would not back down. She was not the woman he'd met in the marsh, nor the one he'd defeated in a dying village.

Now it was her forearm in his throat and her voice in his ear and his surprised look. "Why won't you be leaving?"

She released some pressure so that he could reply. His words dropped like stone. "It is not your concern."

With a strangled cry, she punched the rock near his ear, leaving cracks and flaked stone. He didn't flinch and she hadn't thought he would; she'd only felt the fear and desperation well up and had to release it or she would have screamed and might not have stopped.

Wu turned away, turning her back on an Assassin. She wanted to shout again, but all that came out was a choked whisper. "Why would you say that? Why do you think you won't be leaving, Zu?"

"You should not be here." His words startled her with their weariness; his hand on her shoulder froze her in place.

The feeling that she should leave immediately whipped across her consciousness like a leaf in the wind. Then it was gone and only the two of them were left; as if they were the dead and buried ones, ghosts to the rest of the world outside, forgotten and alone.

His hand slipped onto her arm, squeezing as he emphasized his words. "You must go now."

"I shall not." And for no reason other than she had imagined it too many times, she faced him and stopped his breath with her lips.

She knew all the old poetry, how lust was headier than the strongest drink and more addicting than opium. A part of her tried to stay above the water that was drowning her but it was so hard to hold onto honor and sense when his hand was sliding up her neck into her hair.

And surely what she did down here, in an emperor's unfinished crypt, did not count towards Zin Bu's divine abacus or the scrollwork of the Divine Bureaucracy. It could not count when the Wheel had stopped turning and not when the dead would not die.

"You should not be here," he said again, but he did not pull away. Instead, he wrapped his arms even tighter around her. "You are the only good and beautiful thing left in my life and you should not be here."

"Zu, the darkness is where I belong." And before he could protest or prove her wrong, she kissed him again. He did not stop her.

All the rules she knew told her to surrender to action and reaction. Don't think. Don't talk. She encouraged his hands and found her fingers their own work. Something tore, maybe it was her shirt or his robe. She had stared for weeks; he had watched her, but now blind in the dark, their hands did their seeing for them.

Wu read his skin like a scroll, following the words of war that were written into his flesh; his history for her to feel. She had no words for him to read, only the roughest patches of skin on her hands and feet, calluses of her years.

She bit her lip when his hand slipped under her shirt. He did not breath when her fingers moved underneath his waistband - but then, her hands were always cold.

And for all the newness of this, of him, she could not play the part of the nervous bride. Nervous brides did not destroy dams or seek revenge at the cost of everything else. Nervous brides did not fight Emperors or consort with gods. Nervous brides did not steep the land in blood or discard their honor, like garments on the floor of an unfinished tomb.

Nervous brides had not lain awake at night imagining just this.

Sometimes she stared into his dark eyes, allowing herself the pleasure of an unmeasured gaze, not afraid to be caught staring here. Sometimes she could not stand his eyes and hid in the darkness behind her eyelids, not allowing herself to see anything, but feeling it all.

This was harmony in discord; this was the eye in the storm. And the rest of her throughts were driven to shadows...

* * *

Zu wrapped the length of cloth around her arm, each strip laid firmly across her skin. He had said something about never seeing someone do it wrong for so long without breaking their hand.

She knew what he really meant.

He still hadn't told her why he had said that he wouldn't be leaving. When she had insisted on an answer, he'd ignored her. If he would not tell her, not even now, then she trusted that his reasons were good ones.

Around and around her arm the cloth went. Zu worked silently until he reached her hand. His work did not stop, but he said, "You are nearing your goal. Grand Inquisitor Jia keeps many secrets in her inner chamber. Enough to appease the princess and earn your way to the palace. But the princess may learn more than she wants to know. I know I did many years ago."

Wu waited. He had hinted at something important to tell her. Perhaps this was it.

"You know that Master Li tried to stop his brother and failed. I was not there to witness that, so I only have the details that you are aware of yourself. Hui in Tien's Landing told you that because of that Master Li's wife was condemned to die. She was with child at the time. I know that for certain. I was there. I was one of the elite ordered to kill Master Li's family."

He stopped at his work and looked at her now. His face was emotionless but she could see it was with effort. She, too, kept her emotions in check, not wanting to break the spell of this confession. "Go on."

"Death's Hand brought the order to kill. We were cowards if we could not see the wisdom of his order. It was the will of the Emperor." He closed his eyes, remembering events long past. "Dirge was burning, your Master had fled, and we stood over a woman who had just given birth. I hesitated - and she was killed."

She said nothing and he continued, winding the cloth in and out of her fingers, each motion smooth and strong. There was more here, she knew it, but she would not press him.

His work was done and he picked up the other piece of cloth, but he did not set to work on her other arm.

"For years I wondered what kind of creature could issue such an order and what I was for following it. It was easier to be a coward than question than Emperor. Now I understand and I hope I have shown you as well. They have broken a sacred trust. I have returned because of that, even though I know what Death's Hand is." He looked up and took her hand. "I killed them all, my fellow Assasins. I would not let them finish their mission. Master Li's child still lives."

"Master Li's child is alive," she repeated incredulously. Hope was not lost. If she was too late for her Master, then there was always the child. She would find it, tell the child - no, not a child, an adult - who they were and then, if he or she wished, she would seek revenge for their father. "The princess will not believe this."

"Her feelings are not my concern," Zu said pointedly, taking her right arm and wrapping it with the same deliberate motions as before, as if he had never told her such astonishing news. "I trust that you can do what must be done."

"Yes, of course. Is it a girl or a boy? Do you know where his child lives?" she asked. "We have to find this person as soon as possible!"

Again he ignored her and she calmed herself. She would never like this part of him, his secrets and how he chose to reveal each part slowly, but she couldn't expect him to be anything other than he always was.

He finished with the wrap and said, "Tell me how it feels."

She flexed her hands. "Good."

He stood and held out his hand. When she took it, he pulled her up, just like he had in the warehouse in the city. For a moment, she knew that if Zu was near, she would always be able to stand up again.

But that was here, in a cavern in a tomb. Before she could think of the future, she had to get to the palace.

"I'm going to meet Grand Inquisitor Jia. She has something of mine." She looked up at Zu and forced some levity into her voice. "I expect you will be watching me."

Her comment provoked a half-smile. "I will have nothing else to do."

* * *

The slaves had been freed, though Wu would be surprised if any of the slaves survived the ghosts. Silk Fox had proven very useful in getting rid of Kia Min's uncle and their swords had dealt easily with the other men and women in the chamber. Now they waited for Shin.

Silk Fox's eyes flicked from shadow to shadow in the chamber. "This place is as still as a - "

"Tomb?" Wu regarded the princess. She'd decided not to tell her Zu's news until she could tell everyone.

"I was going to say as the shrine in the Imperial Palace. The courtiers aren't very pious." Silk Fox shifted from foot to foot, betraying her nervousness. "Where were you last night?"

Wu was surprised the woman had waited this long to ask and was prepared with her excuse when Shin's appearance saved her from any explanation. The Assassin was surprised for only a moment and seemed to find her challenge amusing. Wu showed him quickly that it was wrong to underestimate her - he didn't have long to absorb the lesson though. The dragon roared, ice froze the chamber, and just for a moment, fire burned. It was over before Silk Fox could draw her sword.

Wu lifted Shin's body and threw him over her shoulder. She was glad she had not used the sword on him; the blood stains would be inconvenient. "Keep an eye out for any Assassins."

"Wu, I have never seen you...never." The princess shook her head. "Again I am reminded that however this ends, we must remain allies."

Wu said nothing. How could she explain that for the first time in weeks both her duty and desire were not at war? Her mind was at ease and her spirit was steady, like still water in a deep pool. Not being torn in two directions made it easier to focus on her mission now.

They left Shin in the golem press machine and told Gang of their success. He was inordinately pleased and wanted to see his former master's disgrace himself. Wu had been counting on it. The man did not notice Silk Fox lurking at the controls of the machine and he certainly did not notice the clay golem plummeting towards him, at least not soon enough to do anything about it.

Now she waited on the pleasure of the Grand Inquisitor. She lurked in the room with Silk Fox, waiting for the woman to inspect the shard and the golem. The masked woman appeared and Wu almost moved a second too late before kneeling and dropping her eyes to the ground. The Assassin did not even glance at her. "Place the shard and activate the newest golems."

"For the Emperor," the Assassins Wu made her lips move as well.

The golem burned to life, straightening and raising its axes in the air. It took only a moment for the construct to roar futilely as Zeng Sai's spirit battered against its stone prison, realizing that not only was it dead, but it was in service to the hated Empire.

The earth began to shake and the Assassins, without the permission of their leader, stood, not knowing why or how this golem was resisting its proper place. If she had thought it powerful in its madness before, she had seen nothing like this.

Wu stood, but she did not stare unbelievingly at the golem that was beginning to rampage, that was striking at its makers. She stared at Jia and through the mask, Jia stared back.

"You. To believe you would dare come here," the woman said as her underlings died around here. "Be assured that you shall not leave. Kill the traitor!"

The Grand Inquisitor slipped back into her private chambers. Wu smiled. The Grand Inquisitor, with all her power, was _running away_ _from her_.

"I'll take care of the Assassins if you can deal with the golem," Wu said to her.

Silk Fox nodded. "Be careful."

The men and women died one, two, three and Wu immediately ran into the private chambers of her enemy. She was not expecting such a serene place, but then she remembered that Jia hadn't designed this tomb, the Emperor had.

The woman crooked her head to the side when Wu took her first step, as if she had heard Wu's silent footfall. When the Assassin turned around, she removed her mask. Serving the Emperor had not treated Inquisitor Jia's countenance well.

"He said you would come," she began. "I am glad you did not disappoint. To imagine that you would bring the battle to our front door and cause so much chaos in the process."

"I had no choice. Your actions forced me to come here," Wu said, watching her carefully. This pretense at speech-making, at reasoned discourse would only lead to bloodshed in the end. "And now I will kill you for what you've done."

"I see. Live or die, the will of the Emperor be done." Jia said it so fatalistically, as if she truly did not care if she lived or died.

But Wu needed to live. She had to find Master Li, she had to see her friends again. She had to see him again and all of those steeled her for the fight.

The woman was terrifyingly fast and Wu was hard pressed. The stone bridge left her little room for manuvering and one of her leaps almost took her over the edge.

But this woman was the one who ordered the burning and the killing. This was the woman who made her homeless. This was woman who had forced Wu and Dawn Star to always look forward because they had nothing to go back to.

The Dragon Sword slipped between Jia's ribs. Wu twisted and pulled and she slumped to the floor.

"For Two Rivers," Wu murmured. She walked up the slick stone stairs to the shrine and picked up the other piece of the amulet. This should have been her birthright, but it had been hidden in this tomb by thieves. Now the amulet was complete and as she put it in place, she felt her power increase.

She took the steps one at a time, plotting on how to escape the lair before the Assassins swarmed out of the graveyard like angry bees from a hive. They wouldn't have much time now so she'd have to -

"Behind you!"

Zu's warning was too late. She turned into Death's Hand's kick and her lungs felt like they were going to burst out of her back. A moment, an eternity and her head hit the damp stones. When she looked up, she could see Death's Hand stalking towards her. But she could not move.

Zu was at her side, picking her up, moving her through the pain. His voice was in her ear and he was saying, "He is too powerful. Go! I will do what I must."

Then he pushed her behind him, and she fell down the stone steps and to Silk Fox's side. She had not hurt so much in a very long time.

The armored man moved with purpose. "You know you can not beat me, exile."

Wu pulled at the threads of her training and tried to weave them together into something that would make her stand. Silk Fox was saying something, urging her to get up, but she could not move and could only watch the tableaux unfolding in front of her.

Surely Zu knew that he was not fast enough for Death's Hand. He had no weapon, no armor, no _advantage_. Terror pushed out any rational thought, and she could only move her lips enough to beg for mercy from the gods of Two Rivers, mercy on her heart for what she was seeing and mercy for her love who could not possibly move fast enough...

But Two Rivers was gone and so were the gods and their mercy.

She heard Zu say, "I wasn't looking for victory. Just a few seconds..."

She couldn't see his face, but she saw the sword that went through him.

Perhaps she screamed or cried out his name, but the stones came crashing down in front of her and swallowed any sound she made. Perhaps there was no noise except herself tearing in two, ice cracking inside her and lightning striking her soul.

She pushed herself forward, to her knees, but Silk Fox was pulling her back. "The fortress is coming down and the golems are out of control! We must run!"

Silk Fox was right. They had to run and fight. She dropped to her knees and placed her palms on the cold stones that moved like a fast stream underneath her. The damp and the cold were underneath her, wanting to be used, wanting to touch warm flesh. The chaos made it easy for her to find the elements.

She pulled out her sword and pushed the ice along its blade. The Dragon Sword frosted to its tip.

"Let's go," she said to Silk Fox. It would only be warm again when it had bathed in black blood.


	16. Chapter 16

It crouched in the grasses behind a mound of mud, a single austere room made of wood and stone. There was no door, just a flap of tanned skin that covered the doorway. Wu pushed it aside with the flat of the Dragon Sword and stepped inside.

She could see why he had walked away from this so easily.

There was an overturned iron kettle and an empty unadorned wooden box in the corner of the room with a moldy copy of _The Celestial Order _inside. A salamander flicked its tail at her before sneaking between a crack in the stone floor and wood floor. She did not know what she was looking for, but that was all she found.

That was it. That was all there was left of him.

She sank to her knees and stared at the wall. She had been a fool. There was nothing here that spoke of him or of his life.

There was nothing left for her.

* * *

Silk Fox and Wu limped into the hotel. "Someone help me with her," the princess snapped.

Dawn Star gasped. "Lian, the blood - "

"Not all ours, farm girl." Silk Fox dropped the warrior into a chair. "Get hot water. And bandages. And you are an idiot," she said to Wu.

"And you are alive." Wu touched her side and pulled back fresh blood. Silk Fox had not fared much better; a deep gash cut across her arm. "Where is the house shrine?"

"I can get Doctor An," Sky suggested.

"Not necessary. Shrine and bandages," Wu demanded, each command undeniable. "Kang, have the Mosquito-"

"- Dragonfly!" Kang corrected.

Her blood loss was making her stupid. "Yes, the Dragonfly, have it readied and the rest of you, prepare yourselves. We will have to get to the Palace soon, while we have the advantage."

"You found the proof you need?" Dawn Star asked Lian.

The princess pulled her mask away, a frown marring her features. "Yes and I find that my father is not innocent in these events. It is my duty to confront him."

"Not _innocent_? Murdering his subjects to make for more obedient soldiers?" Wu laughed a little hysterically but it turned into a harsh growl. "I will kill him myself if you don't have what it takes to do so."

Silk Fox took the clean bandages that Hou handed her without thanking him. "You will let him explain himself, Wu. He is still your Emperor!"

"Who is _still_ holding Master Li hostage!" Wu shouted, snatching the bandages and pressing them against Silk Fox's wound before she could disagree. But all the exertion made her gasp and clutch at the wound in her side.

She knew why she was doing this. All this shouting, all this petty anger, it was keeping her above the water that she would drown in if she allowed herself one moment to think of -

_I will do what I must._

She turned her sob into a choke and Dawn Star ordered the Black Whirlwind to carry her to the shrine. The area was mercifully empty and when the ogre of a man put her down, Dawn Star held her and ordered her to empty her mind, to allow herself to heal.

The words she used were exactly like Master Li's, which brought Wu's head out of the water, out of the pain for the moment she needed to concentrate. The wound did not heal completely but it was enough. She clutched at her friend and held on for dear life.

Somewhere she heard Sky angry - such a funny thing to think of an angry Sky - and Lian yelling back at him. She would have to explain later that it wasn't Lian's fault, that she'd done this to herself. She should have died half a dozen times with the way she had left herself open to Assassin swords and attacks, but her luck had held right until the last moment, when they'd found the Watcher and his men. She'd been so tired then that she'd barely felt his sword slip into her skin.

He was dead now. All of the Assassins were.

All of them.

Dawn Star's hand smoothed her hair and Wu whispered into her shoulder the words she dreaded saying. "Zu is dead."

Her friend sat back. "What?"

The second time was no easier. "Zu is dead. He died saving me."

Dawn Star said nothing, only held her friend tighter than before and ran her hand over her hair. She heard speaking, but Dawn Star, who so rarely asked for anything, ordered everyone to be quiet and to leave them. It was only then that Wu felt safe enough to let herself shudder once and twice. But tears would not come.

She sat up slowly, disentangling herself from her friend's arms. Nothing. She had brought the ghosts of the Necropolis with her and all their emptiness. And just like those ghosts, she knew that madness would overtake her if she didn't hold onto herself as hard as she possibly could.

She picked herself up. "I can't walk into the Imperial Palace covered in blood."

Dawn Star stood up with her. "Wu, take a moment for yourself."

"Later," she said firmly, but she knew it was the firmness of cracked stone. It would stand, but only until the water came and froze in the cracks and tore the whole facade into pieces.

She would stand, but only as long as she had to.

She readied herself quickly and the others were already at the Mosquito - no, the Dragonfly. The Mosquito was the first one, the flying swimming ox - and she shook her head. No. She couldn't think back to then. Not to the fires or the death or the hand on her shoulder that had offered sympathy and an explanation of who her enemy was.

She found her seat, and they took off.

The flyer rattled and shook around Wu. Dawn Star was on her left. Sky was on her right. Silk Fox was sitting in another's place. It was another difference, another slight change, and it cut her.

Dawn Star took her hand and squeezed it lightly; she felt it from somewhere far away.

"Sky." He turned to her. "Tell me. In your story, did any of the Eternal Companions die?"

He didn't answer and she stared straight ahead at the palace floating in the sky.


	17. Chapter 17

The sky looked like rain. "We should go back to our camp," Wu said.

Dawn Star frowned. "It is practically dark. We shouldn't wander around in a swamp in the middle of the night."

Wu froze. So right. So exactly right, but they hadn't broken camp. They hadn't brought anything to start a fire or to sleep on and -

And Dawn Star was already walking back in to the hermitage as if it were the right thing, the smart thing to do.

She shuddered, inside and out, and then followed her friend into a dead place.

It was not right that she should be sleeping in his home without him.

* * *

Lian found she was not as welcomed in her home as she had been. "What do you mean I shouldn't come in?" Her glare caused the serving woman to fall to her knees.

"Only that it is dangerous and I don't know why, mistress. Please!" Wu did not know if the serving woman was begging for the princess to listen to reason or just to stop glaring at her, but Lian motioned for the servant to leave.

And that is when Wildflower fell over screaming in pain. She and Dawn Star went to the girl's side as she thrashed and moaned.

"Does she need a doctor?" Sky asked.

"No," Wu said shortly. The girl's pained black eyes faded to red and then blue as each spirit begged for her help in defeating the other. Dawn Star looked at her.

"I can do this," she said, trying to reassure her friend. "I'm not too weak."

"But who are you going to help?" her friend asked carefully.

She realized that there was a time when Dawn Star wouldn't have had to ask that question. "Chai Ka. I will aid you, Chai Ka!"

The palace melted around her and she was in a misty land where only she, Chai Ka and Ya Zhen stood. The toad demon gave off a putrid smell here, one of decay and disease. It hissed at her, rocking side to side, trying to keep both of his enemies in view. "You think your treachery will stop me, mortal? As long as corruption remains in this world, I will be here!"

"Perhaps," Wu said, drawing the spirit of her Dragon Sword. She brandished its misty ghost at the beast. "But you will have to find a new place to live, I think."

Ya Zhen might have been a match for one of them, but not together. In no time, he flopped over, and slowly he melted into the mist and gray and only Chai Ka and she were left.

"Thank you. Wildflower, too, thanks you." The great spirit bowed and she bowed back.

But she did not tell him that part of her decision was because she did not want the demon tormenting her about her secret and her loss. Chai Ka at least had the decency to keep his musings private - _that_ is why he lived and not the toad demon.

Lian was anxious to leave when she returned and so they went, through the maze of halls and levels that made up the Imperial Palace. Wu was surprised at how such a large building could have so many spaces seemingly devoted to nothing, to have areas that were 'little used' when the rest of the Empire seemed to be spilling over with too many people. Her mouth tightened and her fists clenched. Yes, too many people - so many they could build the Wall until they died or be sacrificed to be stone soldiers and no one would make a fuss.

The final hundred yards was excruciating. Wu expected to be overwhelmed with guards and Assassins at every turn, but there was nothing but shadows flitting in between pillars that stretched high above them.

"We are almost at my father's receiving chamber," Lian whispered. Her dark clothing made her almost invisible in the unlit hallway. "I will confront him, Wu."

"_We_ will confront him," a familiar voice said. Dawn Star - and Sky - were behind them. She added, "You are not the only one who lost her master."

Wu nodded. Who was she to deny her friend revenge? They had lost the same – too much. "Of course. We will do this together."

Wu did not know what to expect when she followed Lian into the receiving chamber. No doubt courtiers felt awe at the architecture or fear at the gaping open maw where a river flowed into the clouds. But Wu could only see one thing. "Master Li!"

She saw nothing of brothers in the two men standing next to each other; though she did recognize the man next to her Master. She had seen his statue throughout the Empire, but his malevolence roiled off him, like heat off the high grass in the summer. Even she felt compelled to bow in his presence; only her Master's defiance stopped her.

Lian and the Emperor circled each other. No doubt both father and daughter had heard of how they were supposed to act around each other, but they did not appear to have ever put it into practice. To be fair, any father might be surprised at Sun Lian's working clothes, but it did not help that Lian's voice cracked with rage and fear. Wu doubted very much that anyone raised their voice to the Emperor twice.

As Lian confronted her father with the evidence they had gathered from the catacombs, she watched the guards and the shadows. The Emperor was not denying his actions; he was not even justifying them. When he raised his hand, she felt the power of the amulet rise in her. And when he shouted "Enough!" she was almost ready for the magic and power that assaulted her. Almost, but it still drove her to her knees. Her friends and her Master were not as ready and they fell to its power.

His back was to her when he began to speak again. "Who among you would dare challenge my right to rule?" he asked the air, not expecting an answer.

"Here," she said firmly, pushing herself to her feet. She squared her shoulders. "Face me."

When he turned he laughed at her. "Do you even know what led you here?"

"You upset the order of things." _You killed my friends. People I loved._ "I do what I must." _I must kill you. I must._

"But for whom, I wonder?" The Emperor mused. "Do you blindly follow the will of your master? Is anything so simple? What did Li tell you? That I murdered your people and caused the restless dead? Side effects!"

She almost choked on her outrage and felt the ice forming at her fingertips unbidden. Yes. Of course. This man would think that the deaths of so many were _side effects_.

"This is about power!" he declared. "Come, student of Li! Your quest for death is at an end!"

And rather than fight her himself, he retreated behind his soldiers and allowed them to fight her instead. The figurehead of the Emperor had never awed her as a child; perhaps that had been Master Li's doing. But him hiding behind his underlings – she had never felt so much disgust for a man she should revere.

Finally she made it to the dais where the Emperor waited to confront her. He was looking at her like a particularly annoying insect. He was underestimating her and it made her bold enough to smile. His grimace did not change, but perhaps she saw a flicker of doubt in his yes?

This was not an Arena fight with cheering crowds and cleverly traded jibes. It was not even an Assassin's fight, all silence and shadows. No, the Emperor shifted between forms and styles like water, but it seemed he was not comfortable in any of them.

It had been a long time since he'd been challenged, she realized, and even the power of the Water Dragon wasn't inexhaustible. It had to be renewed in a human vessel and she would not allow that. The slice of the Dragon Sword, the injuries of a thousand cuts, the freeze of ice; she would not stop.

When he died, he turned to dust.

And that…was the end. The men and women who had killed her friends, destroyed her village, kidnapped her master and killed her lover were dead.

She did not feel exaltation or joy. Maybe that would come later. Right now she felt a glimmer of relief but that was all and it was stifled under the weight of so many deaths.

"My student." Master Li walked past her and up to the dais, where the crumbled body of the Emperor and the shard sat. He plucked the green stone from the dust and said, "You have made me proud."

And her heart lightened. Not all was lost. Master Li and Dawn Star were alive. Though her Master was a prince, it did not matter. She'd fought through the heart of the Empire for him; it would be nothing now for the three of them to ensure his regency – or succession! Whatever he wanted. She had done anything for him – and would continue to do so.

She almost grinned, knew it would earn a rebuke even now, and covered it with a respectful bow. "We have much to discuss," she said evenly, trying to hide her emotions.

"I'm sure there is, my student." He walked toward her, holding out the green gem in front of him. "Your abilities have grown immensely. But it also does my heart good to see that you have remembered what I taught."

She looked up from her bow just as he tossed the stone high. "Even the basics."

The fist came at her heart and then her stomach and she of the lightning reflexes and ice-cold mind could not muster strength or speed to stop him. She clutched at her stomach and felt white hot heat.

Her knees hit the floor and she looked up at her master. He said nothing and watched her die, silently, on the steps of the Emperor's dais.


	18. Chapter 18

Dawn Star was asleep but Wu could not.

There had been many sleepless nights since they'd left the palace. Much of it had to do with memory; memories of what she'd done, what she hadn't done, what she'd said and not said.

Tonight her sleeplessness was not born of memories but of what-might-have-beens. What might have been if he'd lived? Would they had come back here? Would he have been content as a teacher in Two Rivers? Would they never have returned to this place but wandered the Empire instead?

What might have beens and maybes pricked at the corner of her eyes. She would not cry. Not here.

* * *

Wu felt cold rain and grumbled at Dawn Star to close the window. But there was no reply and she realized through the fog of her memory that this was not how it felt to wake up in a bed, that she shouldn't remember hurting so much.

Something was far away, something was lost, and nothing felt right to her.

Wu sat up suddenly. The way Master Li had hit her... She grimaced. Something had died inside her. She'd felt it dying, something very important.

Then she opened her eyes and truly saw.

The blackness spread out before her. A rain fell that was neither cold nor wet. She looked at her hand, looked through it, and saw the ground below.

It took everything she had not to sink back into the mud and will herself into non-existence. She had killed monsters and men, defied the order of the very Empire itself, in order to save her Master and for what? She had only met Death and condemned herself to a semi-existence on a battlefield in limbo.

A chittering pulled at the edge of her hearing, then a tide of moans punctuated by short terrified screams. Despair was a thing that she could touch if she just reached out for it.

She stood up. She would not succumb to mud or not-rain or despair. She would not become like those lost souls hovering around the edge of life, siphoning purpose and will from those that still breathed.

She pushed away hair from her eyes, a strange sensation as both her fingers and her hair had little weight to them. It was a gesture of the living, but it did not matter. She had the will of the living as well.

If she was dead, then she would find Zu.

She had a feeling that he would be angry if she did find him, angry that she had allowed herself to be killed after all he had done to warn her away from danger, after the sacrifice he had made to make certain that she would live, but that did not matter.

Now they had forever and that was all she needed to make him forgive her.

She did not know where to go, so her first step was towards a light in the distance, but when she saw a shadow to her left and went to investigate, she found that she could not go in that direction. Her will and purpose, the things she clung to so desperately, were not her own. She was pulled towards the light, just as the voice of the Water Dragon filled her mind.

_Follow the pillar of light._

She had no choice.

No choices! No choices, she thought, as she was forced to dispatch the mad spirits that surrounded her. She had never had any choices. First she had been manipulated like a shadow puppet by one Master and now her strings were pulled by another one.

Wu was pulled up the steps. At the top hovered the blue-scaled woman who had haunted her visions since the cave under her school in Two Rivers. Her clawed hands were clasped in prayer and she floated to and fro like a buoy on the river, but she saw no peace in her presence. She named her tormentor.

"Water Dragon, what do you want from me _now_?" she demanded. "I am dead. Is that not enough?"

If a goddess could look surprised, this one did, but only for the briefest of moments.

_We do not have much time. The transfer of power between your Master and the old Emperor is almost complete. When it is done, I will be helpless again._

She closed her eyes. There should be tears, but the simplest things did not exist when one was a spirit. "I still don't understand why Master Li would betray me."

_He wanted the power of the Empire and his plan took twenty years to reach fruition. It was a prize too grand to let go of and to waste on his brother's madness._

Or me, Wu thought.

_For you to fulfill your destiny, I must send you to Dirge now, while Sun Li struggles to maintain control of his new power._ The Water Dragon faded for a moment and she moaned, as if in pain. _Quickly._

She widened her stance and shook her head. "No. I can't do this alone. Bring me the spirit that was Sagacious Zu. Then I will do all that you ask."

_You cannot do this; we do not have the time._ Wu detected a hint of desperation.

"I am the only one here," Wu retorted. "And I have the rest of eternity."

Wu expected anger, a gesture of impatience, but the goddess only sighed and it sounded like water running over rocks. _I tell you now, Spirit Monk, even if I could find him, I could not bring him to you nor take you to him. What little power I have leaks from me like blood. The only way you will ever see this spirit again is if you set that which is wrong right again. Only until the Wheel of Life is turning properly, only then will you be able to find the one you seek._

Wu wanted to scream at the unfairness of it all and felt the madness of death creeping at the edge of her vision. Instead she ground her teeth together and said, "What must I do?"

_Go through the portal. You will find help on the other side and I will guide you as well._ The Water Dragon gestured at the door before her. _Go and cleanse that which is unclean. Only then will I have enough power to save you, for you are the only hope Heaven and Empire has now._

* * *

The phantom wind pulled at her sash and her hair; it blew the ghost of snow around the ruins of her ancestral home.

Strange that the first time she saw her birthplace, it was with spirit eyes, the first time that she walked its' paved stones, it was with steps that made no sound.

As she followed Abbot Song, the eternal fight raged around her. She walked through monks and soldiers. They took no notice of her.

Abbot Song told her the story of the fall of Dirge, how her too cunning teacher had preyed on the faults of impressionable monks and then betrayed the betrayers. Their blood had defiled the water, weakened the Dragon and allowed the entrance of the invaders.

Now they stood before her; ghosts like her, but they could see and touch her. And this one, Monk Xian, was intent on destroying her. The remains of the woman's soul fought like a mad dog, all fire, and had the power of madness driving her. But Wu had ice and there was so much ice here.

Abbot Song yelled out a benediction as his staff hit a ghost on the head. "Find peace now!" And the ghost dispersed. They were done and the fountain could be purified.

It seemed a fitting punishment that the traitors were bound here and that she defeated them; the daughter of one of their friends that they had offered up like a sacrificial animal to the Empire. Wu almost regretted it; defeating a spirit meant dispersion and dispersion meant peace – for even a short time. They did not deserve a moment of peace…

She shook her head, sending her dark thoughts away. No peace? And for what? For having the misfortune of being manipulated by someone smarter than herself? Then she too should be bound here if that was the punishment for that crime.

She fixed the seal into the fountain and the water flowed clear. Abbot Song was impatient to go, but she had questions. "How did the Emperor do that? Bind the souls here?"

The abbot's lip curled in distaste when she asked. "We bind wandering spirits who are confused and can't find their way to the Underworld. We bind them to ourselves, bring them to Dirge and then release them to go back to the Wheel. To bind a spirit to an object is cruel. They are compelled to stay when they desire to go to their rest."

"But what of a spirit in a body? Could that be done?" Wu wondered aloud.

"That is not a question to even be considered," the Abbot said shortly.

Which meant yes, she gathered. Binding a spirit was obviously not to be done except in the direst circumstances.

But it certainly opened interesting possibilities and she mused on them while she followed Abbot Song to the second fountain. Its seal was guarded by a demon who taunted them when they appeared.

After it appeared, Wu stretched for a moment before saying, "Trap?"

Abbot Song nodded. "Most definitely. But we need the seal nonetheless."

They followed the demon down the path to the cavern beneath the temple. It stank of blood and death.

"Stay here," she ordered. "It will attack you first. I can feel it."

Abbott Song looked surprised, but did as she asked. "I will make sure no one attacks you from behind then."

She bowed before entering alone. The cavern was filled with burning torches and melted wax. The incense smelled wrong and the demon was waiting for her. "Dirge belongs to the master I – "

She attacked, not waiting to hear what it served or why. "You remind me of the birthing in our village of an ill-omened cow. Its calf had two heads too. And they killed that one with as little thought as I will -"

Her attacks had landed hard, but it recovered enough to electrocute her. _So this is what Storm Dragon feels like_, she thought as her muscles twitched of their own accord. She rolled just before it stomped on her and picked herself up behind it.

She had a moment to make a decision and she hoped that her transformation forms would work when she was dead. When the shuffling abomination finally turned its mass towards her, it was hit in the face by a long sticky tongue. It did not take long for it to die, poisoned, on the cold floor of the cavern.

She exited the cave and showed Abbott Song the seal. "One more. But I think that we have more to worry about here than cleansing fountains."

He nodded. "Without the Water Dragon here, other … beings… are capable of taking hold."

She frowned. "Beings? So not gods or demons?"

"The opposite of gods and demons," he said quietly. "Beings that want nothingness. Beings that hate death and darkness as much as they hate life and light."

She stared off for a moment. "I see. Well, first things first. Let's put this seal back."

Abbot Song left her before she entered the temple, finally able to join the fight against the dead Imperial soldiers. She did not shout or rail against the Water Dragon's decision; she knew it was useless even though she now realized that she wanted to speak to the spirit more – to know more about her parents and their lives.

That, like many things, was not meant to be, she reflected as she took the stairs one at a time up to the Temple. She wandered through its broken doors and past the wreckage the invading army had left decades ago.

As soon as she entered the empty hall, the air filled with maniacal laughter. It reverberated off the stone walls and the icy floor. It sent an involuntary shiver up her spine because that voice behind the laugh was her own.

Before she could get to the fountain or find the seal, her way was blocked – by herself.

She looked at her doppelgangers, different only in stances and weapons. "At least give me the pleasure of your names. Because you are not Wu the Lotus Blossom."

They bowed simultaneously, mocking her with her own smile. "We are Despair, Sorrow and Rage."

Her panic rose for a moment, but she fell into the eye of the storm, letting her fear and panic whirl harmlessly around her.

"Oh," she said. "I'm surprised that your master sent you three, as I know you all quite well."

They attacked her together and Wu focused to dodge their strikes. Rage she had met as Two Rivers burned to the ground, but she defeated her there and she would defeat her now. Rage threw flames at her, but Wu dodged them easily, taking her down with a Thousand Cuts.

Despair she had met twice - once on the spirit fields and once in a dark room at the Arena. Their blades clanged against each other; Despair's Dragon Sword versus her Crimson Blades. It did not know the Crimson Blade style though and had no focus. She was dead in just one moment.

She had carried Sorrow with her since the pillars had come tumbling down in the tomb of the Emperor. But Sorrow knew her as well as and did not fall as easily as her sisters. She wielded ice as skillfully as Wu did and knew all her tricks. Wu felt herself running out of focus, so she dropped her blades and remembered her basics. Only now she knew the flaw and she fixed it, drawing her doppelganger in and destroying her with her bare hands.

She only hoped that she'd have the same opportunity with the man who had caused her Sorrow.

The laughter turned to a scream of rage, just as the Water Dragon appeared in the air above her. _Hurry. The gate will close soon._

Wu looked over her shoulder and saw a portal in the air, all power and spirit. She ran and dove headfirst into it…


	19. Chapter 19

Like the night before, she could not sleep. She slipped from the hut and walked behind it, until she felt the ground shifting beneath her feet. She stopped and listened to the night sounds of the swamp. Croaking frogs, the drone of insects and distant splashing filled the night with noise.

That was all she heard and her heart sank, like it did everytime she listened. She heard nothing, not during meditation, not during practice, not even in her dreams.

Perhaps he truly was gone.

* * *

The sun was gone and the stars in the sky burned above her; the snow sparkled on the ground far below her. Above and below, it all seemed the same.

How strange that she had been to two heavens and yet this was the closest she had ever felt to the gods.

Was this the view on the night of her birth? Was this the same sky that her mother and father looked at on their last night? Was the army already burning its way up the mountain; a fiery dragon at the command of the Emperor?

For the first time in her life, she was beholden to no destiny. She had no strings, she could not be moved by manipulation. From now on, her choices – and her mistakes - would be her own to make.

Such power frightened her because there was nothing to anchor her now.

Dirge knew her thoughts, knew her uncertainty. The air became a thing alive and not with spirits. The wind mourned around her, tearing at her clothes for all the lives lost here, screaming and pounding its fists against her chest. Then it left her, fleeing at another's presence.

There was the sound of steps on stone. Dawn Star stood beside her. She had a blanket wrapped around her and a blanket in her hand. "You must be cold."

"No." Wu did not feel cold in the way Dawn Star meant the word. She felt the air, but it didn't freeze her skin. At the same time, she was as frozen inside as the ice that slicked the stones.

"What are you thinking?"

"Of how grateful I am to be alive." And that was true. If she were not alive, liars, usurpers, and murderers would walk free and unpunished. She added, "Of how grateful I am that we are all alive."

"I keep looking at you expecting to see a ghost," Dawn Star said, laughing to hide her nervousness.

"No ghosts here," she said lightly. It was true, she had cleared Dirge of all its ghosts, except the ghosts of memory.

"What…what was it like?" Dawn Star asked.

She knew what her friend meant. She wished the words that came out were comforting but they could not be while the heavens were in chaos. "Without the Water Dragon's help, I would most likely be insane by now."

Her heart twisted, hoping that Zu would be stronger than she was. He _must_ be.

They stood there, not speaking about what loomed between them.

_It had been a conversation between worlds, one that took a moment and an eternity and in that eternity the Water Dragon had given her the knowledge she thought she had wanted – but hadn't. _

_That is what had disoriented her when she had landed alive – and cold, something she had not felt in awhile – on the stones of Dirge. She had almost been stepped on by the horse demons that had come through after her, but even while they burned the cold air around them, even while she fought them one two three out of existence, she was thinking only one thing._

_Dawn Star was Master Li's daughter._

Each of the group had reacted in their own way with Lian's being the most vocal and angry. But Dawn Star had let the news fall on her and over her like a shroud. Even now her hands tightened in frustration and anger.

It wasn't fair. It just wasn't, but she had forced herself to say those words because it would have been equally unfair to hide the truth from her friend.

Wu forced the words out because she had to know. "What would you like me to do tomorrow?"

Dawn Star stared over the edge. A movement of her foot pushed a clod of snow into the darkness below them. "I don't know. I think if he'd bothered to look beyond his ambition then he'd have seen me. I was just as much a cog in his plans as if I had been a part of Lord Lao's furnace."

Wu smiled wryly. She'd broken that too. "That's why I'm asking you what you want. If anyone deserves a say in his fate, it is you."

"You have a greater stake in all this. It was not me that he … that he killed." Dawn Star still was having troubles reconciling Sun Li, the scheming prince, with Master Li, their doting master. "I will leave it up to you."

Of course. Freedom from strings meant more responsibility, not less.

It was some time before Dawn Star said, "To imagine that Zu saved me from the Assassins. That is why he seemed so familiar to me."

Wu froze at his name and put ice in her voice to hide her emotion. "I don't know why he didn't tell me when he had the chance."

Dawn Star nodded. "I think it was because he was keeping us safe. We were drawing enough attention to ourselves and imagine if Lian or Death's Hand had found out at the wrong time. I am a rival after all…"

Dawn Star's joke did not have the effect she wanted. Death had also killed Wu's sense of humor. "I had told myself that I was going to raise an army in the child's name – take the Empire for him or her – if I hadn't been able to save Master Li. Now look at us. He's raised an army against his daughter and his student."

"He still doesn't know," her friend reminded her.

"If I see him, shall I tell him?"

After a moment, she said, "I do not expect that it will change his mind, but perhaps…there is always hope."

Wu's mouth tightened. Hope was a precious commodity; she didn't waste it on impossibilities.

"I'll be in the tent," her friend said eventually and Wu listened as her steps crunched away in the snow.

When had it changed between them, she wondered. There had been a time when she would have felt comfortable telling her friend anything and now it felt like she could tell her nothing. But the thought that she would be disappointed in her kept her silent.

So many things had changed since Two Rivers, but if given the choice now, she would not go back to that time. No, not even if it meant her fellow students and all the villagers were still alive. She would not willingly return to being a puppet.

Yet she had been so certain of her loyalty on that bridge in the Imperial City, dressed as someone else, eating noodles with Zu. Why hadn't Master Li known that? Why hadn't he known that she would have followed him - supported him - no matter what? He must have known that old tools could still have their uses in a new Empire - if they weren't misused or broken beforehand.

Now she had gone through a torturous reforging at the hands of the Water Dragon. The goddess, even Wu herself, did not know what kind of tool she had been rendered.

And Master - no, not her master anymore, - Sun Li would have to contend with her.

Let Sun Li come. Let him call armies against her. Let him come and see what she was. Unmovable, unfeeling and unafraid; she was the ice of Dirge now.

She waited for the lamps in the tent to extinguish one by one. Finally, when she had only the light of the stars to guide her, she walked across the icy stones.

She had had another reason to stand at the edge of the abyss, listening in the dark. If she were to hear Zu's voice anywhere, it would have been here and it would have been now.

But she had only heard the wind, nothing more.


	20. Chapter 20

During every long night since her confrontation in the Imperial Palace, she went over each and every choice she had made, trying to determine whether or not she could have saved him and the Empire.

She knew it was a fruitless exercise, but she could not stop wondering.

Torturing herself was the least she could do for him.

* * *

They were not pleased.

She did not know why she had expected a different reaction. True, the Black Whirlwind did not seem to find the presence of the man who had hounded them across the Empire too disconcerting, and nothing bothered Kang, but the others…

They did not understand. It had been so easy to bind him to her will. Sun Li had only recently come to the Water Dragon's power and he had not known that she did not need the amulet to exercise her abilities as a Spirit Monk.

And her powers burned inside her now, just like ice on wet skin. They begged to be used against him and his soldiers and assassins. The fight against Death's Hand had barely whetted her appetite for revenge and wrenching control of him away from Sun Li was easy.

Ignoring Sun Kin's pleas for release was also very easy.

Once, someone had told her to take every chance that she could get. Death's Hand would be a poignant reminder to her former Master that she had defeated him once and that she could defeat him again. And there was no doubt that having an unquestioning warrior at her side would make her more powerful.

Apparently, the others didn't see it in the same way.

Lian was furious, perhaps furious that the thing she had feared the most was now at Wu's command. "You cannot do this. He is a member of the Royal Family."

"Please don't do this." Dawn Star added. Hers was not a plea of fear though; Dawn Star truly believed that what she was doing was wrong.

"It's for the good of the Empire," Wu explained. "For _your_ Empire, Lian."

"You will not tell _me_ what is good for the Empire," the princess retorted. But she took a step back from Wu and from the look in her eyes.

"This isn't like you," Sky added and perhaps it was his words that broke her patience. Perhaps if he hadn't tried to understand her when she knew he knew nothing about her – about what this journey had driven her to and what she had become – then maybe she would have explained. Maybe they would have agreed with her reasoning or maybe they would have convinced her of theirs.

But he had and she didn't and then she saw the path that she should not take. She saw the dissent and she saw how easy it would be to silence them.

There were their spirits and there were their bodies and here was her mind. It was only a matter of joining them together. She could see it so easily.

Dawn Star, Sky, Hou and Lian were lifted into the air for moment from the force of the joining. They hung there like rag dolls for a moment, helpless in her power. When they fell, they went to their knees and it reminded her of another time, when helpless opponents had bowed to her on the sand of the Arena.

She cut that thought off and they slowly stood up. There was no way to cut the string that tied her to them without losing control. They would all have to deal with this situation for now though. She would not fail when she was so close to destroying the man who had destroyed her home, her life, and her love - all for the sake of a nebulous idea called the Empire.

Sky said this was the act of a coward; the act of someone who didn't deserve the power. Yet she knew she was strong enough to walk away from this. She only had to stop Sun Li. Beyond that, she'd suffer the consequences of her decisions. She faced the four, their fury burning in her mind. "I know you don't believe me, but I need Death's Hand to win. To throw away the advantage we have now would be madness."

She did not speak of forgiveness. It would be an insult to the hate and betrayal they were feeling now in their hearts. "Ready the flier, Kang."

She followed the now nervous inventor. The bound ones walked in her footsteps like they were tied to her waist with chains. She felt the pull of their souls on her. She could not wait to undo this.

Death's Hand's voice was a rumbling in her chest. "I've seen someone take this path before."

She nodded. "And after me, no one will be able to find it again."


	21. Chapter 21

She did not know how long she stood there, lost in thought. At some point the darkness of night faded into gray mist and she could see the cattails waving in front of her. The mist clung to her skin, causing goosebumps. She roused herself. Dawn Star would be up soon and it would be a nice surprise if there was a fire going.

She wasn't sure where she would find dry firewood in this place, but that was what Dire Flame was for. She set off on an animal path, hoping it would lead her towards something useful.

Dawn Star found her later.

* * *

_Behold! Words would not have sufficed!_

The corpse of a god was stretched out in front of her, above her, around her and the horror of her bound companions tugged at her mind.

_Rebirth is impossible while this continues…_

Blood flowed, but this blood was pure and clear and it was a river that ran through the palace and watered the empire.

Lian gasped. "I have never seen such a crime against the proper order of things."

She ignored the other raised voices of her companions because the Water Dragon was here, above her and waiting for her to make a decision.

_Your Empire must find balance without the flow of heart water that is released._

Wu nodded. Blood could not flow forever, not even the blood of a goddess. What would happen when this corpse became a dessicated husk? What god would need to be violated then?

_You must defeat your Master. You must stop the power he draws from me. Soon he will be too strong, even for you._ The goddess paused, as if she were gathering her strength. _You must destroy the source of that power. You must destroy my body._

The Water Dragon was pleading for release, for mercy, and for Wu not to do what she was contemplating. She did not have to let the Water Dragon go free. She had learned of another way to compel the power of the gods.

She needed all the power she could muster so that she could cut the ties that bound her to gods and masters once and for all; for their plots and plans had killed her love just as surely as if they had struck him down by their own power.

She would be no one's pawn again. Moreover, the power of a god might restore what she had lost.

Dawn Star's thoughts were like a sword in her mind, just as her voice said, "Wu, you cannot. You _cannot_."

She turned to her friend; there was no doubt that Dawn Star knew her plan, knew the possibility she was considering. It took a moment to build a wall, to shut her out of her mind. It wasn't hard. She'd been shutting her friend out of her life since that day in Tien's Landing.

She did not have much time to act. Sun Li would learn of her presence shortly; Lotus Assassins would mass to fight her.

She would need blood…

Wu looked into Dawn Star's eyes and then pulled a Lotus Assassin's spear from his dead hands. She stepped forward.

The spear flew true and struck the heart of the machine that kept the Dragon alive and bleeding. There were sparks and the apparatus shook the tomb they were in. Wu lost her balance, fell to her feet and watched as the machine destroyed itself. A twenty year long abomination was now destroyed.

Somewhere Sun Li was crying out in rage. The thought made her smile.

She stood and found the eyes of her bound companions on her. Dawn Star spoke first. "For a moment, I thought..."

"You thought wrong. I am here to restore order and balance," Wu said shortly.

That was a lie. The true answer was that becoming a god would only make them more interested in her. Would she become a pawn in just a much stronger god's games? Or would she become a gameplayer herself, moving mortals like pieces on a board, spending their lives like coins in a dice game? She knew she was not strong enough to say 'no' to both of those questions.

And she did not think that Zu would appreciate her finding him if it meant she had destroyed the Empire to do so. She was not the only one he had died for.

The Black Whirlwind swung his axes. "We have company."

Lotus Assassins poured in the room. "Hold them here," she ordered. "Death's Hand, it is time to confront your brother."

She did not know if her friends would survive, though she had no doubt that she would know immediately if they died. But there was nothing she could do now. Sun Li had to be destroyed and only she could do it.

Death's Hand led her through long hallways and tunnels until they came to the throne room again. "My brother will send assassins to strike from behind. I will hold them here so that you may confront him."

She nodded and he asked, "And then I will have earned mercy? Release?"

She shrugged. "That will be Lian's decision. It is not my right to decide the fate of an Imperial family member."

He took her judgment well. "You have surprised me, Spirit Monk. You still speak of her as your Empress."

"You have been around power-mad Imperials for too long, Sun Kin. And I am cut from sterner stuff than them."

She left him there in the shadowy hallway, knowing that he would do his duty to protect her from threats from behind. This is why she had kept him at her side; an immortal warrior to save her from distractions.

Sun Li was waiting for her at the bottom of the steps to the throne. He seemed calm, sure of himself, even though she knew that he did not have the power of the Water Dragon to rely upon.

He was wearing the same armor as Death's Hand. That would make it easier to kill him.

"Ah, there you are. I knew you would come and I have grown very good at waiting. You are very different from the student I once taught. Death has changed you."

"Yes," she agreed. But he was referring to her death and she was referring to Zu's.

"I apologize for that indignity but it was necessary."

"No. It was not," she said firmly. "You had no idea of my loyalty. Perhaps you have been playing games for too long to understand true loyalty, but you had it from me once. I would have killed Lian for you, served you as a servant to her Prince, but it never occurred to you that there might have been another way. You have been alone for so long, I do not think you can remember how to place trust in another."

"It is time for this to end." She dropped into her stance and waited for him to fight her.

"You are all that stands between me and my empire," he said, as if in afterthought. She felt him summoning the power of the Water Dragon that he had conserved and the throne room shook.

Stone constructs of demon elephants and oxen fell to the floor, cracking the stone they stood on. She laughed, high and loud. Stone was so easy to crack with the application of ice! Did he not know that? They broke under her hands like carelessly dropped clay pots in a marketplace.

But ice could not defeat the stone spell that he threw at her and for the second time in her short life, she found herself immobilized by the power of a god. Unlike the Spirit Fox's power, this was too much for her to break from within and she found herself on a nebulous plane. Alone.

His voice surrounded her. "Yes. This will do nicely. Seeing death come and being unable to stop it."

She felt heavy, drained.

"Physical barriers are no match for those we place in our own mind. My power has encased you in doubt, held you within your own burden."

His words drove her to her feet. Here, doubt was both a physical and mental force, pummeling her body and her mind but she tried to resist, "I am stronger than this. Than you!"

"You and your followers are playthings," he mocked. "They are held just as you are and you are all too weak to match my power!"

Before her, four Sun Lis materialized, mist and fog, but she knew they could hurt her in this place. She willed herself to her feet and just as she did, three of her companions came to her side.

"You are not alone," said Chai Ka. "We can assist you."

"Lend your strength to mine," she ordered. "I cannot defeat him and save you without him."

The Black Whirlwind's confusion and Hou's uncertainty still pulled at her, but Chai Ka said he would show them the way. They ran forward to face the doppelgangers and then disappeared, leaving only one enemy to face. She cleared her mind and defeated it easily.

She walked towards the pillar the doppelgangers had been guarding, but as she approached it four new threats appeared. "Amusing, but pointless. My talons are deep within you."

And her companions came again. Dawn Star, Sky, and Lian stood beside her, filled with doubt but yes – Dawn Star had hope.

Wu made her choice and undid the binding between them. Their presences left her mind, leaving her stronger. "I have no right to ask you for your help, but without it, we will be trapped here until our souls are destroyed. Will you aid me?"

Lian frowned. "It seems we have no choice."

"Not much of one," Sky added. "But it is preferable to being compelled."

Dawn Star smiled. "I knew my Wu was still in there. I am with you."

They ran at her enemies without thinking or flinching, taking them off the battlefield and leaving her one. "Do you see that? My allies strengthen me, Li! You were too quick to throw yours away!"

And she attacked him again, her anger at her betrayal driving her to fight. Again she won and again she approached the pillar that held her. This time nothing attacked her.

"Your efforts are meaningless," he sneered. "A god holds you. Nothing in the mortal realm can save you! Nothing!"

She could fight forever, but he was right. He was a god now and she was less than that.

He had always been right. What was her right to defy him? She never used to question Master Li and now he was much more. Could she question the will of a man who was an Imperial prince? If she found that strength, she would be questioning her life, her childhood, her very name. If she found the strength to fight him and she won; she would be destroyed in the same way as he if struck her down himself.

Who was she to fight him?

Her questions wrapped around her, each a chain that bound her power, strength, heart and soul. The pillar in the mists was the only solid object here. That was his power and she ...she felt herself fading into her chains.

_You showed me a door I had thought closed._

She saw a wavering in front of her.

_This is your swamp, Wu. He can't keep you under the dark water._

It was. It was him. He gave her that half-smile that she loved, one that she had sworn to destroy a prince for. _"_I told you I would watch you."

She said his name, a prayer and a lament and she hated herself for not knowing that he had always been with her.

"Even here, I have moved with you, hidden, trying to keep focus."

She struggled to her feet, the chains binding her spirit falling away. She rushed to his side, reached out to him, but her hands passed through him. Now his smile was tinged with sadness.

"You cannot stay here or you will die, Wu."

She wanted to say that that was fine, she wanted to die if it meant she could be with him, but she couldn't. Why did she get to give up if he had not? She only nodded, not knowing what to do now.

"All that I am, all that I was…" He turned to face the pillar and aimed a strike at its heart. His glance fell to her one more time and he said, "Is yours."

She felt a breath on her lips and then the pillar cracked and the light poured out…

And she was screaming his name as the stone fell from her lips. Her master's look of frustration moved to fear and fear her he should. "You killed him," she murmured. "You and your machinations. Your schemes. This ends!"

She did not wait for his answer, but attacked him with all she had. This close Sun Li's power reminded her of the fetid stink of the Mother. There was death in it; it could take and take and take…

Then she saw it; a glimmer of a silverfish in a dirty stream. Then another and another until she could see a school of silver swimming through his dark power.

Death took and took – youth and beauty and the strong - but that was not always true. The Water Dragon had also given peace from the pain of life and another chance at redemption. The Water Dragon had given water, just as she hadn't.

Wu knew this and she knew that Sun Li didn't. This was his flaw. She allowed herself a smile; the smallest one.

Wu would give him everything he wanted.

It did not take much once she discovered the chink in his fighting style. He expected opposition and taking, so she gave him openings that had no exits, showed weakness where there wasn't one.

Her final blow was with her hands. It felt right that way.

He fell at her feet and raised his head. "You surprise me, yet again." He coughed and raised himself to his knees. "I'm a better teacher… than I thought."

As Sun Li fell to the ground, his grip on heavenly power loosened and with it the bonds of the Water Dragon. Wind that smelled of spring rain whipped the tapestries in the throne room in a frenzy and above her appeared the goddess.

She was not the insubstantial spirit of before, but a force and a thought, a blessing and a curse. The Water Dragon bowed to her and she bowed back, not out of deference, but of duty.

Sun Lian was restored as the rightful ruler. The Wheel turned. The heavens were in balance.

When the Companions entered the throne room, they found empty black armor in a pile, surrounded by many dead assassins. Near the body of her master, they found Wu sobbing, but she refused to say why.


	22. Chapter 22

Dawn Star had become used to waking up without her friend there. Sometimes she blamed it on Wu having walked the paths of the dead; sometimes she blamed it on all the death they had seen. She blamed it on ghosts and on manipulative masters, but the truth was Wu's restlessness could only be blamed on Wu. She was allowing herself to be haunted by too many things and she refused to let go of her painful memories because it was all she had left – of him.

She was nervous when Wu was not outside when she woke up. She was worried when she had not come back by the time Dawn Star had washed her face and cleaned her boots. When it had been over an hour and a light rain misted the area, she decided to find her friend.

She found Wu's footprints in the mud and followed them as best she could through the swamp. The cattails swayed above her head and she saw nothing, until the path widened.

It was a lake of stagnant water. Dragonflies flew around, their wings making a chorus of hums. Covering the surface of water so black that is looked like polished obsidian were the plants. Thousands of them, all in bloom and in every color. Pink, white, yellow, red, orange. A lake of lotus blossoms in the swamp.

Wu was sitting on a rock, staring at them. In her hand was a book, tattered and dirty, but she paid it no mind. She did not even look up when Dawn Star stood next to her.

"I found him," was all she said. And she clutched the book to her chest. "Did you know what he once told me about the lotus? That the stalk is easy to bend in two but it is very hard to break or separate completely."

"It was only much later, when I was at the Palace, that I found a book that told me what that really meant. The lotus stem is a symbol for lovers and no matter how far away they might live, nothing can really separate them in heart."

When Wu was ready, they walked back to Two Rivers.

* * *

Wu sat patiently on the floor in her quarters, meditating as she had been taught long ago.

It had been three months since the fall of the usurper. Wu was allowed out of her apartments for short public appearances and then shuttled back to her quarters. She had been the one who had stated that her solitude was voluntary and she had requested that her guards let no one in unless they asked her first. In such a way, it did not look like the Empress and the Champion of the Empire were at odds. Wu just wanted stability for the country now and she would gain it through lies if she had to.

She felt Dawn Star coming before she was at the door and stood up to open the door for her. Ever since Dirge, she felt the essence of her friends when they were close enough. She hoped for their sake that they did not feel her.

She had not seen her friend alone since Sun Li had been killed. She understood why no one wished to see her alone.

The guards moved aside when she opened the door and she welcomed her friend in. "Please, please, have a seat. Would you like some tea?"

Dawn Star nodded and Wu made it herself. They did not speak the entire time and Wu allowed herself to be lost in the preparations. Eventually she sat down, across from her friend and poured the tea.

Dawn Star was wearing court finery and she did not look uncomfortable in it. It suited her and reminded Wu that her friend was rightfully a princess. She knew she must look a bit disheveled but with her public outings very well planned out, she always knew her schedule and when she did and did not have to be presentable.

"You look like the mad hermit that the guards are making you out to be," Dawn Star said.

"Oh good. I was hoping to cultivate that opinion. It would keep them from speculating on others."

They drank their tea in silence again.

Wu finished her cup first. She placed it carefully on the table between them and said, "I'm sorry."

Before Dawn Star could say anything, she continued. "I'm sorry for what I did. I knew that I would lose my friends forever by doing it, but I saw no other way."

"There is always another way," her friend said.

"And someone once told me that you should take every chance you get," she retorted.

"And who gave you that poor advice?" Dawn Star said mildly.

"Zu!" His name scorched the air. She hadn't said it in months but thought it every second.

Perhaps it was the emotion behind her outburst, but Dawn Star dropped her serene façade and showed concern. "When did he say that?"

It came like a torrent, like Two Rivers in the spring after the snow melted. From her sparring in Tien's Landing to her last glimpse of him while trapped by Sun Li, she told all, now not caring if Dawn Star hated or was shamed or shocked by her. She had lost everything to save the Empire, everything but the truth and she gave that to her friend, every last word of it until she had nothing more in her.

"I loved him so much," she ended.

As the last words left her mouth, she realized she was sobbing and Dawn Star was next to her, stroking her hair and whispering, "You carried it all alone…" with no judgment in her voice, just sadness and love.

And they sat there like that until Wu fell asleep. She did not dream.


	23. Chapter 23

And so it had been. Dawn Star had petitioned the Empress on her behalf and Lian, ever the stateswoman, knew that it would not be a good idea to anger the secret Heir to the throne. By then she had also convinced Sky to visit her friend and Wu had made her apologies to him as well. He'd accepted them wholeheartedly but she knew that none of them, save Dawn Star, were likely to trust her again. But trust was certainly more than she deserved at this point.

She and Dawn Star had left the palace not knowing where to go. She made some money fighting in the Arena and finishing off Kai Lan's organization. They hunted down rogue Assassins who had not submitted to the will of the Empress. They did much in the Empire, yet always seemed to be heading towards Two Rivers.

And now their business here was done.

"Come on," Wu urged as she packed her things on the flier. "We don't want to lose too much light."

Dawn Star put her things down and crossed her arms. It was not like her at all and Wu stopped packing. "What is it?"

"I'm not going."

"You want to stay here, alone?"

Her friend nodded. "It's my home. I want to rebuild it."

"By yourself though?" Wu could not think of a lonelier task. "And how do you know anyone will come here again?"

"Kia Min was alive. I'll find her hometown, invite others to come. We know a town can thrive here – and a school."

"You want to reopen the school?" she asked incredulously.

"I think I know enough to start one. I will hire good teachers and oversee it. It's the least I can do to honor our friends."

Wu shook her head, trying to keep her dread at bay. In all her talk of the future, Dawn Star had not invited her to stay. "I don't know what to say."

"Goodbye. That is what we say."

"But why?" She lost her composure and began shouting to hide her fear. "We've been together all our lives! You can't leave me now!"

Dawn Star stared at her levelly. "I will not live at Dirge – and you know that is where you will end up."

Wu froze. Dirge. She had not spoken of it to Dawn Star, to anyone. "Why do you think I must go there?"

"Because you did not find peace here." Dawn Star gestured, taking in the ruins of Two Rivers. "You told me you were looking for peace, but that was not true. You're looking for his ghost and you did not find it here. The only other place in the Empire you might find him is Dirge. You know that. I do as well. And I will not go there. It is time for me to make my own life, Wu, as much as it pains me that we must part. But I cannot follow you forever and you will never be content here."

It was all true. She had Zu's writings now, but eventually that would not be enough and there was only one place on the mortal plane where spirit was stronger than the body and she might be able to see him again.

She owed it to the Empire as well. The Great Wheel turned, but there would still be lost spirits needing to find their way to the other side, there would still be a need for her kind. She was the only one who could restore the Order.

"You are right." She took her things off the flier. "You're going to need this more than me."

Dawn Star protested but she'd hear none of it. "Walking will do me good and if there are any bandits around here, I'll have them cleared out for those new townspeople of yours."

They stood in front of each other awkwardly. "Take good care of the garden."

"I will. Especially the one you planted."

She smiled. "I appreciate that. I will send you word when I can."

"As will I." And then Dawn Star bridged that gap between them and gave her such a bear hug she thought she would lose her breath. "I will miss you, friend."

Wu knew she would cry if she said anymore so she patted her friend on the back, smiled tightly and walked away.

The last thing Dawn Star saw of Wu was her back. The last thing she heard of her was her whistling. It was the first time she'd heard that in a year.


	24. Chapter 24

Epilogue

"There is someone here to see you." When Wu did not look up from her scrollwork, the monk added. "He is from the Imperial City."

Wu put her ink brush down. Peasants from the villages closest to the Temple sometimes came to seek her guidance but no one came from the Imperial City unless they were here on official business. "I heard no flier."

"He said he walked, Abbotess."

Wu nodded, as if a man walking to Dirge was done every day. "He has been offered refreshments and a room?"

The woman bowed lower. "Of course, but he has refused. He insists on seeing you immediately."

Wu wondered what new trouble had befallen the Empire. The Empress did not have enough faith in herself at times, but Wu would listen to this messenger and then she would send him back. The Empire was only her concern very rarely; she had the dead to watch over now.

The man was ushered into her presence, his head lowered; Wu sent her monk away. He fell to one knee before she could see his face. He removed a scroll case from his back and presented it to her. "Abbotess. From your agent in the Imperial City."

She took it from him. There was a scroll from her agent and other papers. She read the message from Li Zuan first. "It says that you sought out my agent and that you asked to come here."

"Yes, Abbotess."

Her lip crooked; no one would mistake it for a smile. "And is it everything that you imagined?"

"Dreamed," he corrected, though he did not look up from the floor. "I dreamed of Dirge."

She paused and looked at the other papers. They were drawings in charcoal, but they were good and frighteningly accurate. It was as if he had sat at the bottom of the mountain, sat in their courtyard, sat in her office and done these.

She frowned. Dreams were important sometimes. Gods never had the manners to just say what they wanted outright. But if the Water Dragon had a use for this one, she would have told her. That was their arrangement.

She glanced at the scroll again. "And yet you have no abilities that can be spoken of; at least, none that would be of use to our Order here. Or so Li Zuan said that he told you. And yet you insisted on making this journey."

"He said that I could come to Dirge, but only if I showed proper deference."

"Yes, you have shown a sufficient amount of humility, young man. Walking all the way here? That is humility enough for one lifetime."

Perhaps he did not see how threadbare his clothes were with travel and if he'd had any soft flesh when he started the journey, he certainly had none now. Perhaps he did not see or perhaps he knew too well. "We are not a fighting school and we are not a monastic order. I can allow you to stay here for awhile, but unless you manifest some talents that we can use, you will have to return to the Empire - though I will not make you walk home."

She lifted his chin with the scroll face, so that she could get a better look at his face. "So what has brought you to Dirge, young - "

The scroll fell from her hands and she took a step back.

"Abbotess?" He said it so innocently.

She had lost her composure for a moment, but she willed back her serenity. It was the hardest thing she had ever done. "What is your name?"

His eyes went to the floor, but now and again they flickered up to look her in the face. She wanted them to stay on the floor, but she couldn't get her tongue to order him to do so. "Wen. Iron Wen from Phoenix Gate. Please do not send me away, Abbotess. Not yet. I've dreamed of this place all my life and I do not know why. I did not even know what it was called until Li Zuan found me sketching and told me what I was looking for. But even now I do not know why I'm here, only that I must stay until I have my answer. Do not make me leave."

"Your entire life, you say." She felt so very tired now. "How old are you, Wen?"

"Twenty years this month."

It would be about right. "If this dream of Dirge has been occurring all your life, then the Gods are involved and I would be remiss to make you leave. You may stay as long as you wish."

"Thank you, Wu."

Her voice cracked like a whip. "What did you say?"

"Thank you, Abbotess!" The boy – for he seemed only a boy – averted his eyes again but he did not cower, even though Wu knew she could mantle herself in the power of her goddess. "Thank you for allowing me to stay."

"You may not thank me later," she said, allowing scorn to tinge her voice. "And I hope your life in Phoenix Gate was not simple. We work hard here and you will be expected to do the same."

He had the audacity to smile at her and it broke her heart, this smile from a man long dead. It came easier to the boy though. "I was training to be an Imperial soldier," he said. "I am used to work."

"You will find that being a soldier is much easier than being a monk, Wen. It involves significantly less thinking, for example. Now find Xitou and ask for a robe and a room. Your morning will be early. Very early indeed."

This boy could not cower, it seemed, but concern did crease the corners of his mouth. He bowed deeply then left her office. She sighed, partly in relief and partly for someone long dead.

The gods were not kind. Or perhaps they thought this was the greatest kindness of all. Wu would help this boy with the eyes and smile of a man who had died many years ago. She would not dwell on possibilities. She would not think of the future. She would do as duty demanded, even if tore her mind to shreds. That is what it meant to be the Abbotess of the Spirit Monks.

She looked out her window. The years had not changed the landscape much; it had not become more hospitable or welcoming in the many years that she had lived here, but she thought she felt the ice thaw, just the slightest.

And she smiled.


End file.
